United Arab Emirates to buy Italian trainer planes

Milano -It took four years of work, and almost a two years' wait, but in the end results were achieved, and they are worth an over one billion-euro contract for 48 M-346 trainer planes. Giving the final OK to the order of these latest generation fighter planes, built by Alenia Aermacchi (of the Finmeccanica group), was the government of the United Arab Emirates, the first to have chosen these aircraft produced by the Italian defence group. Having outbid such competitors as the KAI [Korean Aerospace Industry] Group, and the British BAE Systems, providers of the training planes currently in use in the United Arab Emirates, now Alenia Aermacchi is to enter the contract negotiation phase.

The agreement announced within the INDEX [International Defence and Exhibition Conference] 2009 ambit, currently under way in Abu Dhabi, also includes an industrial component, with the setting up of a joint venture between Alenia Aermacchi and the Mubadala Development Company geared to the building of industrial facilities to assemble parts of the aircraft produced in Venegono (Varese province). This will be the first aeronautical facility located in the United Arab Emirates, which have long been investing in the civilian and military sector. With Alenia Aeronautica, Mabadala has already worked out an accord on composite materials geared to the civilian sector.

Current satisfaction at Finmeccanica's general headquarters makes up for the more sombre mood of the past few days because of news from the US concerning the presidential helicopter. Finmeccanica Chairman and CEO Pier Francesco Guarguaglini seemed optimistic that the accord with the United Arab Emirates could "rapidly lead to new negotiations (...) This is only the first step. I am also convinced that this will be a successful aircraft." Guarguaglini also pointed out that the "M-346 is an advanced-concept product," and that, besides the national customer [the government], "which is always there, customers outside Italy are also needed. The Emirates are the first non-Italian customer, and they are launching the product on the world market."

With the M-346, Alenia Aermacchi is already on Singapore's short list for the Fighter Wings Course programme, which will replace the current air fleet, whereas in the United Arab Emirates the Italian group is in the running with another fighter plane, the M-311, and will be competing against the PC-21 of the Swiss group Pilatus. "With the choice of our trainer plane by the government of the United Arab Emirates, the M-346 has become a world-class reference point in terms of training pilots for new generation fighter planes," said Giorgio Zappa, Finmeccanica general manager, according to whom over the next 20 years the market could even call for 2,000 aircraft, and the Italian group hopes to be able to corner a 35 per cent share of that market.

Now it is a matter of waiting for a decision by the Italian air force, which has already announced that it wants to purchase 15 planes, using funds from the productive activities ministry. Today, this decision seems closer after the contract landed with the United Arab Emirates. It was Defence Minister Ignazio La Russa who stressed that the contract won by Alenia Aermacchi is an "Italian industry victory," which concretized also thanks to the "decisive role played by the defence ministry." The M-346 Aermacchi Master is an advanced, fourth generation trainer plane, whose first pre-series model was test flown on 8 July 2008. The plane was specially conceived to train pilots who will be flying the new Typhoon Eurofighters, purchased by the air force, and the F-35JFS, which is currently at the development stage, and on whose programme Italy too is participating.

Several companies of the Finmeccanica group (Selex Galileo, Alenia Sia, Sirio Panel, and Selex Communication) are involved in developing the trainer plane, whereas a marketing, training, and product support on international markets contract has been signed with Boeing.

The stock marked responded favourably to the Finmeccanica listing thanks to the new contract, posting a 1.77 per cent increase.

Source: Il Sole 24 Ore, Milan, in Italian 26 Feb 09

BBC Mon EU1 EuroPol ME1 MEPol 0am



BBC Monitoring. Copyright BBC.