IAF fighter deal: Rafale much cheaper than Typhoon; govt rules out review
Times of India , feb 10

NEW DELHI: It was the “substantially higher cost” of acquiring and operating the Eurofighter Typhoon that led to its ejection from the almost $20 billion MMRCA (medium multi-role combat aircraft) project to supply 126 fighters to IAF.

“The French Rafale jet, the eventual winner, beat the Typhoon hollow both in terms of life cycle costs and direct acquisition costs. The entire MMRCA project cost would have gone up by around Rs 25,000 crore if Typhoon had been selected over Rafale,” a top defence ministry source said on Thursday.

Given all this, MoD has ruled out the possibility of “any comeback” by Typhoon despite carping by the four nations (UK, Germany, Spain and Italy) backing it, and will begin “exclusive and extensive negotiations” with Rafale-manufacturer Dassault Aviation next week. “The actual contract for the complex project should be ready for inking by September-October,” said a source.

British PM David Cameron may have vowed to “encourage” India to reconsider its decision to go in for Rafale, instead of the EADS-manufactured Typhoon, in the largest “open-tender” military aviation deal going around the globe. But that is highly unlikely to happen.

“The fact is that the cost deferential between Typhoon and Rafale was very high… it would cost India around 22% to 25% more if the former had been selected. No government can agree to so much extra,” the source said.

Both Rafale and Typhoon had been found “compliant” on all the 643-660 technical parameters laid down to meet specific operational requirements of India, after gruelling field trials by IAF test pilots spread over two years.

The other four jets — the American F/A-18 ‘Super Hornet’ and F-16 ‘Super Viper’, the Russian MiG-35 and Swedish Gripen – were weeded out from the hotly-contested race last year since they did not meet all the “test points”.

“We went by the book, first in the extensive technical evaluation and now in the meticulous commercial evaluation, without any external factors coming into play,” said the source.

For one, the “life cycle cost” of operating the Typhoon over a 40-year period, with 6,000 hours of flying, was found to be “higher” than Rafale after extensive calculations of flight costs, spares, maintenance and the like. “The life cycle costs were actually the tool to determine who was L-1 (lowest bidder),” he said.

For another, the difference in the ‘direct acquisition cost’, which will actually be used to ink the contract, was even bigger. “The Typhoon’s commercial bid was way too high. Rafale was the clear L-1 in both life cycle as well as direct acquisition costs,” he added.

Dassault will now have to submit a detailed project report on the transfer of technology (ToT) to Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL). While the first 18 jets will come in “fly-away condition” from France from mid-2015 onwards, the rest 108 fighters will subsequently be manufactured under licence by HAL over six years.

“We will negotiate each and every element in the complex project with the French. Payments, as also the 50% offsets specified in the contract, will be spread over 11 to 13 years,” he said.

The first jet built in HAL is expected to roll out by 2017-2018. Thereafter, HAL will deliver six jets per year, which will go up to 20 per year later. “HAL will achieve 85% technology absorption by the end. Incidentally, Typhoon’s cost of ToT was also very high,” he said.

This “mother” of all defence deals will later become the “granny”, as reported by TOI earlier, since India will in all probability go in for another 63 fighters after the first 126 jets.
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IAF fighter deal: Rafale much cheaper than Typhoon

In order to have but a slim chance they would not only have to cut the fly away cost, but also the cost of operating the Typhoon. I think they would have more chance asking their tooth fairy.
Beside as I’ve said before, the UK’s political reaction was very bad, and killed any remote chance of comeback.

arm exports = jobs + money. No socialist govt. would say no to that. In fact no govt. would say no. They only problem would be for the green party to win. But I know that’s not going to happen any time soon. Le Pen might make some noise but won’t be elected (but will receive 1 million from the state to fund her campaign, so she might make some money just for showing up:cool:).

@ BlackArcher : Swiss chose to change the criteria of the evaluation in order to select the Gripen based on price. Dassault said since the criteria has been changed, let’s submit our proposal based purely on price.

India is different. It was always performances first, then look at the cost.

But of course that won’t stop Eurofighter to try and submit another bid. But BAE which is spearheading to move will have to agree with Germany, Italy and Spain. While Germany might be convinced to go an extra mile, my prediction about the political will behind the Eurofighter collapsing if they lose India is happening with Italy refocusing on the F35 that is said to be cheaper.

And thing have only started to go bad the the EFT. I doubt their actual effort is going to go anywhere. Simply because they have done a political issue out of it, and it’ll look like India caving to UK’s pressure. They were supposed to have made a “sacrifice” on price already so how much money are the other countries willing to lose on a already very expansive program ?

actually, over enemy territory, they can keep the radar silent… if anyone tries to detect them, they’d get his bearing with SPECTRA, look through passive ways (IR) and react as needed. In case they need to use the radar, it’s given for a quite comfortable range which should reach way further than any serious airborne threat they may encounter.

Anyway, we can discuss it ad nauseum, in the end, the real capabilities being classified, it’s all just speculation…

Actually over enemy territory you first use intelligence to know where the enemy’s radar are (satellies, ELINT/SINGIT aircraft and other assets) and at which frequencies they operate, then you can send a strike package with you aircraft flying very low and your radar in low emission look down mode. Because most waves will bounce back against the ground and because the power is too low, you will only be detected if you fly right over a radar, and your waves won’t be detected too far against static noise.

You’re only 100% dead if you emit at high altitude where you’re sure the radar’s waves will propagate much farther away than you need.
Many cruise missile are using radar to better fly close to the ground without damaging their discretion.

So I believe Rafale + Scalp for the most defended targets is a win. You don’t have to get to close, yet you can penetrate the enemy territory through his hole, and release your weapon.

Why do you think the AdlA Gabriel were flying along the Lybian’s cost weeks before the Rafale went in ?

Very few countries are able to properly cover their entire territory with enough radar to guarantee the same detection quality all along their border. The farther away from the emitter you fly, the easier it will be to lure its return (since the further away and the more the radar will have to compensate for the weak return, distortion etc.)

Unless the enemy has a very good intelligence capability it’ll be hard form them to differentiate on their radar between a Gabriel fully passive and a normal transport aircraft or even an airliner in some cases.

So with proper preparation and intelligence (as in all war), Rafale can go into enemy territory and come back. Should the enemy have a very very good radar coverage then you can download a 2D Map, and fly the plane along satellites data only (INS, GPS, preloaded map from Elios, and soon real time update from ELINT satellites).

India is likely to have access to the French satellites for the Rafale and Russian satellites with the PakFa among other goodies. So I’m sure it won’t be a problem to strike. The only question is will the gain be worth it, given the geopolitical reality of its neighbours been nuclear powers.

I don’t think so. It’s much harder to modify an aircraft for carrier use, than it would be to modify the same aircraft for land.
The cost would simply not be worth it. Much more effective to upgrade the sensor fusion to give the pilot an edge.

The Rafale B will take care of the more complex mission or use of drone etc. (Notre that LM made an allusion to build a two seats version for the F-35 for that very purpose…).

The Rafale M used Scalp, AASM, GBU, pod Reco NG, MICA to great effect in Lybia. I don’t see Dassault making money to make a two seat variant that would be heavier and so less range, to offer marginal capabilities.

The upgrades for the existing variant is much more important. Beside only two navy might be interested. India and Brazil. I don’t see Brazil asking for it so that leave India (who might always surprise us). So unless India pays for it herself I don’t think that Dassault knowing that France won’t buy it will even share the cost of such development when no export would follow.

Rafale PESA’s range is about 100+ km, making the AESA about 200+ km. There is no doubt the Captor has a better range than the PESA, in fact even precious generation MSA radars on board M2k have a better range.

The point is the PESA has always been an interim solution, waiting for the AESA technologies to mature and become affordable.

However what it lacks in range it make up for it in agility, detect and track more targets than MSA (double that of Captor), virtually resistant to jamming (what no MSA no matter how good can claim), potential for attack modes, true multi-modes etc. In fact without the RBE the Rafale cannot claim to be truly “omnirole”.

You’ll have to explain to me you’re thinking about passive MSA… I wasn’t aware of it.

They go to the US, and then practice with simulators…

There is not going to be a Rafale N anymore.