The Ministry of Defence (MoD) has awarded a £173 million contract to British firm Draken to provide advanced military training, boosting jobs at Teesside International Airport and other UK sites, according to a press release issued on 29 January 2025.
The five-year agreement will see Draken simulate air combat, missile threats, and electronic warfare for Royal Air Force, Royal Navy, and Army personnel. Training exercises over the North Sea will use 14 Dassault Falcon 20 jets, eight L-159E ‘Honey Badger’ fighter aircraft, and one Diamond DA42, based at Teesside and Bournemouth. The contract is expected to support over 200 jobs, including 24 apprenticeships across both locations.
Defence Procurement Minister Maria Eagle MP announced the deal during a visit to Teesside, stating: “This investment delivers world-class training for our Armed Forces while boosting jobs and national security. Aligned with our Defence Industrial Strategy, it shows defence can be an engine for growth in every region.”
The training will prepare UK forces to counter emerging threats, including protecting Carrier Strike Groups from missile attacks and enhancing battlefield reconnaissance. Exercises will meet NATO standards, with Draken replicating adversary tactics using advanced electronic warfare systems.
Air Vice Marshal Mark Flewin, Air Officer Commanding 1 Group, said: “This partnership is fundamental to ensuring our forces out-compete adversaries. The training simulates contested environments critical for NATO readiness.”
Draken CEO Nic Anderson added: “We are proud to innovate high-end training for the warfighter. This contract reflects our team’s relentless performance.”
The MoD confirmed the contract aligns with its Plan for Change, aimed at strengthening regional economies and national security. Teesside International Airport, a key site for the programme, will see upgraded infrastructure to support the fleet. Draken’s training services, branded Interim Medium Speed Operational Readiness Training Services, will run until 2030. The MoD did not disclose further details on potential contract extensions.
IMAGE Gerard van der Schaaf, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Does Draken still have the F1 Mirages? I know they bought at least one and I think crashed at least one; but I would have thought a supersonic aggressor would come out from time to time.
Thy did acquire ex SAAF F1 and 12 Cheetahs (a local version of the Israeli Kfir with the Mirage F1 engine) in 2017.
i guess there is a separate Draken for the UK. cause Draken international in the US has A4s, Mirage F1s, L-159s, Mig 21 (so cool) and atlas cheetas. i thought they got F-16s but apparently those got cancelled and diverted to ukraine.
i cant think of a better job than working for those guys! talk about a dream that would be to fly Mig 21s as an aggressor…
Not a British firm..sadly this is a story of the destruction of a great British firm flight refueling limited, that became a big defence firm worth 4 billion under the name Cobham, the board against the will of the largest shareholder. Decided to sell to a U.S. private equity firm, the UK government gave the go ahead and this successful British firm was sold and the n the equity firm did what they always do, asset stripped it and cut up the body sold off the bits..Draken a U.S. company purchased one of limbs….well done UK government for letting another British firm fall because a greedy board wanted an immediate payoff by a U.S. equity asset stripper.
Talk about a warped and biased summary of what happened. The Board and 93% of Cobham’s shareholders approved the company’s sale for a price of 150 pence per share, a 50% premium on the share price. The largest shareholder only wanted the board to find a better offer. and was not opposed to the sale of the company. It was the 11th largest shareholder and the family that opposed the sale.
No it’s what happened, the company was sold to a private equity firm that asset stripped it, the largest shareholder actually referred the sale to the UK around security risk and loss of sovereign capacity…it was not a better deal they were after it was a safer deal that secured the company.
You’re in no position to talk about warped or biased commentary with your clueless MAGA rubbish.
Has your ignorant leader built the border wall or stopped the Russian invasion of Ukraine yet? Thought not.
Too busy blaming one legged dwarves for the Potamac River plane tragedy I expect.
👍
£173 million over 5 years.
Which was cheaper.
This, all contracted out.
Or the in house RAF 100 Sqn and the FAA 736 NAS, flying Hawk alongside the Dassault Falcon 20s which have flown from Hurn for decades providing the EW element.
I read the headline and thought “Draken isn’t a UK firm is it?” Came to the comments section to find the backstory behind this. Still… never let the truth get in the way of a politicians spin hey ..
Problem here is that the Dassault Falcons were most definately not in-house, they have been flown under private contract for decades (first by Cobham then Draken UK), The Hawk T1’s which were used by the RAF and FAA were very much 1970’s level-tech, and 1970s vintage with no radars giving a quite basic Red Air capability vs the much more modern L159E’s that Draken uses that have better availability, performance, radars (well they actually have them) and RWR systems. The only Hawk T1’s left in fleet are used for the Red Arrows so something new or adapted would be required if this goes back in-house. Key thing is that its up to the contract supplier to find suitable Airframes and Pilots (and everything else) to do the job instead of the RAF/FAA which, in theory, uses the available funds much more effectively as it doesnt use up RAF/FAA manpower, fleet airframes and flying hours to achieve. The aggressor flying that is done out of Teeside looking at Flightradar24 seem to be flying pretty much all the time and the contact states that they must be available all year round. As other posters have mentioned they is a very interesting and insightfull interview with one of the ex RAF pilots who flies these which is worth looking at https://youtu.be/BBqe4syQD8M
I get somewhat annoyed with the MOD ref the “saving money” idea. The same applies to the SAR helicopter contract. It seems to go like this… Lets save money by removing a squadron which is available in wartime with one that is not available in wartime.
Whatever happened to the Yeovilton based FRADU. ( Fleet Requirements and Air Direction Unit) I can remember their civilian pilots in Hunters providing radar calibration targets and Canberra’s towing targets for our gunners to shoot at during my 10 years in the Royal Navy in the late 1970’s and 1980’s.
The FRADU moved to Culdrose in 1995 ( at which point all the hunters were cut and it only ran T1 hawks) in 2013 it was converted to 736 navel air squadron and FRADU ended.
But the time you would have known it is was run by flight refuelling limited, that became Cobham..which was sold to a U.S. private equity firm and then carved up and asset stripped.
Wow, I can’t believe that we are calling Draken British because they bought up one part of Cobham. The selling of Cobham and now the subsequent destruction of Cobham’s operations and manufacturing in the UK should be a scandal. How did we let this happen???
Useless, inept, possibly corrupt politicians. When the choice for the electorate is between one proven incompetent or another, democracy doesn’t work well.
The failure to prevent British companies falling into foreign hands has been disastrous for long term wealth creation. And it continues with the Royal Mail ltakeover nodded through. The only remedy I can see is to nationalise without compensation whenever undertakings that secured approval are broken eg ARM Holdings.
There is no point nationalising stuff. The Conservatives believe in free market economics and that the market will deliver solutions, they also fundamentally believe in the small state and it should not interfere with the free marker.
Anything nationalised will be privatised at a cut price the next time they come in. There is no way to prevent it unfortunately. The same mentality behind not blocking US takeover of everything, its free market capitalism and the state shouldn’t interfere.
Things like this should be done in house, as outsourcing is only cost effective is competition brings down prices and raises efficiency, but when there is one customer and one supplier none of that is achieved, as that one customer gets messed over. Plus no economies of scale to achieve by benefiting from other customers
Royal mail was offloaded by the government, as an audit carried out showed with out the government propping it up it was effect-ley bankrupt. mind you not helped by Peter Mandelson allowing other companies cherry pick deliveries while not having to bear the cosy of universal service
I would highly recommend watching Aircrew Interview on YouTube. There is one interview with a former RAF pilot who who flies one of the Honey badger and he shows you around it, quite interesting
‘Draken International, LLC is an American provider of tactical fighter aircraft for contract air services including military and defense industry customers.’ ‘In September 2020 Draken International purchased Cobham Aviation Services based in Bournemouth, UK, and renamed it Draken Europe.’ – from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draken_International – so hardly British!
Not against the use of Draken – but it would have been far more preferable if an actual British firm was able to get the contract. We need to invest more in our own British-owned industries, not ones owned by dubious allies.
Could we not have Hawk T1/T2s trainer aircraft undertake the dissimilar air combat training? or too low performance to go up against Typhoon and F35B in real combat?
I thought we had a shortage of T2s thanks to engine issues.
We use to but the Hawk T1’s have been retired with no replacement
So another example of paying through the nose to fill a capability gap that was caused by false economies?
They were replaced by the much cheaper contracted out option in the shape of the contract awarded to Draken.
As I posted above.
RAF had 100 Sqn on Hawk for aggressor role and the FAA had the same with 736 NAS.
Going way back, there was FRADU, which included a det at Gib.
Ahhh FRADU and the days of Canberras and Hunters 🤩
I spent many an afternoon playing on those hunters and Camberras.
And FRADU was a contracted civilian company flying MOD owned aircraft. It is only relatively recently that the aggressor role has been performed by in house RAF/RN squadrons, though with civilian contracted ground crew. Almost every air force in the world utilises civilian contracted companies to provide aggressor resources.
Why can’t we just hire Tom Cruise?
He’s global top gun and can survive a mach 10 crash and be well enough to order a pint right afterwards.
He does tend to crash a lot though and it does mean all pilots are contractualy obliged to sing “Danger Zone!” when in the cockpit.
And for script reasons needs to attack a target with bombs…
This is good news, been from the Tees area see the Falcons regularly .It’s quite fitting really that Teesside Airport still has a role in Defence having been a former RAF airfield . Apparently there’s a company what fly Hawker Hunters in a slimmer role with a few other types of Ex fighters. Would of loved to see Hunters over the Tees area ,but still good news. 😀 🛫
Could these Draken jammers be turned on Pitlers jets in a time of war?
In theory yes but they are privately owned and operated, so no guarantee that you would have any crew to fly or operate them!
If you haven’t read Vassal State by Angus Hanton please have a go. I couldn’t even finish it. It was like a horror show. The UKs stuffed.
Genuine question. Why does this get outsourced? Why does the airforce need an outside organisation, with old jets, and ex-military pilots. Why don’t squadrons face off against, both getting practice, rather than posing money to an outside party for half the practice?
aircrew and jets. you dont have enough active pilots or jets to be dedicated trainers. thats all these guys do so they are good at it. im a little confused why the US does it since they still have dedicated aggressor squadrons with F-16s and F-5s whose full time job is doing this… but again its probably just down to numbers.