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Thales selected for Watchkeeper final phase

03 March 2003

Thales has been selected for the final phase (4 to 2 downselect) of the UK MOD's Watchkeeper Tactical Unmanned Air Vehicle (UAV) assessment. Watchkeeper will provide the UK's Armed Forces with a globally deployable capability to deliver imagery and intelligence to battlefield commanders and is a core element of the MOD's Network-Enabled Capability Strategy. Thales will deliver Watchkeeper through a UK industrialisation strategy which, from early in the programme, will see production, integration, support and future upgradability undertaken in the UK. This strategy will create a wide range of opportunities for UK industry and will guarantee security of supply to the UK Armed Forces.

Alex Dorrian, chief executive of Thales Plc, remarked: "This latest Watchkeeper contract award underlines Thales' substantial systems integration and design capabilities in the UK that have just been underlined by the MoD's decision to appoint Thales as a substantial partner in the UK's future aircraft carrier programme."

Thales will now undertake the System Integration Assurance Phase (SIAP) to demonstrate how its system can be rapidly introduced to service with low programme risk and optimum performance. A feature of the approach adopted by Thales is the ability to introduce new technologies and operational concepts into Watchkeeper. The Thales bid includes class-leading air vehicles derived from Elbit Systems' Hermes 180 and 450 together with sophisticated sensors which can detect and identify targets in day or night and through heavy cloud cover as well as designating targets for precision attacks. Advanced Ground Control systems and communications links will allow Watchkeeper to operate at long ranges and with very high endurance.

In parallel with Watchkeeper SIAP, Thales is investigating opportunities to support the UK MOD in the Joint UAV Experimentation Programme (JUEP). These activities will allow the MOD to develop wider UAV concepts of operation in a joint industry/service effort.

Thales' activities encompass optronics, air defence, sensors, communications and naval systems. The company is the UK's second largest defence contractor, having been a supplier to the MoD since the First World War. Thales now draws together, under one unifying brand name, businesses including Racal, Thomson Marconi Sonar, Shorts Missile Systems, Thorn EMI Electronics, Avimo and Pilkington Optronics. Employing 65,000 people in almost 50 countries, Thales has 12,000 staff in the UK. In 2002, Thales global revenues were over £7 billion.

Notes to Editors:
The £8 million System Integration Assurance Phase (SIAP) will see a range of activities undertaken to prove the system integration of Watchkeeper itself and also within the wider battlespace digitisation architectures. The majority of the Thales SIAP work will take place in a purpose built System Integration Laboratory at Crawley which enables Thales' engineers to work closely with DPA and MoD users to optimise the Watchkeeper solution.

Press contact :
Matt Pothecary - Tel : + 33 (0) 1 53 77 86 26