'Eurofighter to Lead Growing Fighter Market'

Posted on: Apr. 4th, 2006 || Source: defense-aerospace.com | E-mail Article | Print Article

'Eurofighter to Lead Growing Fighter Market'

NEWTOWN, Conn. --- The world combat aircraft market is much more competitive than it was a year ago, primarily due to two significant developments. First, the U.S. Air Force failed to overturn cutbacks suggested for the Lockheed Martin F-22 program in early 2005; the service will now acquire about 180 F-22s. Second, the Eurofighter consortium scored a major coup at the end of the year when Saudi Arabia signed up for "at least" 24 Typhoon fighters.

Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program may also take additional hits, but the high volume of anticipated international sales would go a very long way toward offsetting any more cutbacks in U.S. buys. More than a dozen nations are participating to varying degrees in the F-35’s development stage.

According to Forecast International editor Bill Dane, “The F-35 will definitely be the aircraft to beat in the coming years, but it will be critical for Lockheed Martin to resolve the dissatisfaction expressed by several international participants regarding work share and technology transfer issues.” Dane adds that the U.S. company must also keep the program on schedule and keep further cost increases to a minimum to fully exploit the aircraft’s market potential.

Back in Europe, France’s Dassault is still looking for its first Rafale export customer while, as noted above, Eurofighter scored with a major sale to Saudi Arabia.

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