Chinese suppliers have been excluded from a Ministry of Defence competition worth an estimated £2 billion to replace the Armed Forces’ Land Rover and Pinzgauer fleets, with the department invoking powers under the Procurement Act 2023, according to a tender notice.

The notice, published on 31 July, covers the Light Mobility Vehicle programme and sets out the selection criteria that will be used to reduce the field to a maximum of seven suppliers invited to tender. Within that section, the department states: “In accordance with the Procurement Act 2023, the Authority is exercising its rights under Section 19 (3)b to exclude Chinese Suppliers from this procurement, for further details, please refer to the PSQ Technical Questions/Conditions of Participation.”

Section 19 of the Procurement Act 2023 governs how tenders are assessed in a competitive tendering procedure. Subsection 3(b) allows a contracting authority to disregard any tender from a supplier that “is not a United Kingdom supplier or treaty state supplier”, or that intends to sub-contract performance of all or part of the contract to such a supplier. Treaty state suppliers are those from countries with which the UK has relevant procurement commitments, principally parties to the World Trade Organization’s Government Procurement Agreement. China has never acceded to that agreement, having applied in 2007 and continued negotiations since without concluding them.

The provision is therefore a trade and market access mechanism rather than one of the Act’s national security exclusion grounds, which sit elsewhere in the legislation and operate through the excluded and excludable supplier regime and the central debarment list.

The estimated total value is £2 billion excluding VAT, or £2.5 billion including it, with a contract running from May 2027 to May 2036 and options that could extend it to 2047. The initial purchase carries options to increase the fleet “to in excess of 9,500” vehicles.

The requirement is built around a single Common Base Platform supporting nine variants, including a General Purpose Vehicle, Battlefield Ambulance, Tactical Mobility Vehicle, Enhanced Protection Vehicle, Command and Control Vehicle and Troop Carrying Vehicle. Defence Equipment and Support declined to divide the competition into lots, arguing a lotted approach carried a “high potential of a mixed fleet of solutions based on multiple platforms from multiple suppliers.”

Among the known risks it lists that could later prompt contract modification are “obsolescence, unavailability or export control restrictions affecting components, subsystems, software or materials requiring replacement solutions,” and new interoperability requirements arising from integration with UK, NATO or allied systems.

The Procurement Act 2023 consolidated and replaced the previous public procurement regime, introducing the competitive flexible procedure being used for this competition along with a national security exclusion ground and a centrally published debarment list. Defence and security procurement operates under a special regime within the Act.

The restriction is not the first sign of nationality-based limits on the programme. A market interest day for the Light Mobility Vehicle project, held at Warminster Garrison in January 2026, carried a notice stating that because of national security considerations relating to the programme, attendees who were nationals of or held passports of certain listed countries would not be permitted to attend.

Scrutiny of Chinese involvement in UK infrastructure and supply chains has intensified in recent years. The government ordered the removal of Huawei equipment from the UK’s 5G networks by the end of 2027, and in 2022 instructed departments to stop installing surveillance equipment made by companies subject to China’s National Intelligence Law on sensitive sites. Concerns have also been raised in Parliament about Chinese-manufactured components, including cellular modules, appearing in vehicle and equipment supply chains.

The Light Mobility Vehicle programme is the first of three Category A sub-programmes within the wider Land Mobility Programme, and was previously known as the General Support Utility Platform. Requests to participate close on 1 September 2026, with an estimated award decision date of 31 May 2027. Down-selected bidders will take part in UK-based vehicle trials, with the notice proposing that those failing the trials be eliminated immediately.

The Land Rover Wolf and Pinzgauer fleets being replaced have an out-of-service date of 2030, having already been extended from an originally envisaged 15-year service life. The Army began the phased withdrawal of the Land Rover at a ceremony at Bovington Camp in March 2026, after more than 70 years of service.