The Thales/Boeing consortium bidding on the United Kingdom's Military Flying Training System announced at Farnborough the team name of "Sterling" as it puts the final touches on its initial concept proposal.
Sterling has no end of positive connotations in Britain, not the least of which is the reference to a venerable heavy bomber of that name from World War 2. The Sterling team, like its two competitors for the key undergraduate pilot training contract, has to deliver its "concept development design" proposal in six weeks. The other two teams in the competition are already named:
-- Ascent, a team of Lockheed Martin, the VT Group and Rolls Royce plc
-- Vector, a team of Kellogg Brown, Root Ltd and EG&G/Lear Siegler Inc.
The U.K. Military Flying Training System (MFTS) encompasses all military flying training in Britain prior to entering squadron training for fast jets, multi-engine and rotary wing aircraft with the Royal Air Force, Royal Navy and Army. It also covers weapon systems operators and back-seaters. Some of the expected drawdown of the RAF force level has already been figured into military planning for this contract.
With the military periodically losing pilots to commercial airlines, it is necessary to develop a more efficient training process, according to Thales. "Crews need to be trained in a shorter amount of time so the military can bring them on more quickly if there is a drawdown [due to commercial hiring]," said Justin Walker, director and general manager of Customer Training Solutions at Thales.
The British Ministry of Defence wants the contractor selected for this project to share risk and achieve a best value for money. There will be cost reduction targets established and some sort of incentive provided to achieve them.
Thales already has three large military training contracts in Britain, while Boeing provides Apache training here. Kelly Wood, a New Zealander, has been named project leader for the MFTS bid at Sterling.
