it was said that the price more than doubled after years of negotiation.. so if the end it was around $30bn, that would mean initial proposal (through Reliance) was below 15.. now, 15bn, which include setting up a production line (which you have to pay for), full ToT (which you also have to pay for) and 126 fighters, that mean each fighter was significantly below $100 million as such.

The price was twice what the MoD had budgeted for it not twice the ‘initial proposal’. $15bn for 126 Rafales was always an absurdity.

Now, if today they have the partnership with Reliance, no obligation to go through HAL (which was mostly downplayed from Indian sources who claimed that for each work hour in France they’d need something like 2.7hours in India, if I remember correctly, inflating the price even more (one may wonder whose agenda it suited) ), infrastructure already in place to make, at least partially if not all, the Rafale in India, I’d be surprised, to say the least, that Dassault makes a proposal at a price that would be too high to consider

Each hour for a line worker in France would set Dassault back by €20-25 compared to €2-4 per hour for HAL. Unfortunately, labour is still only a small part of the cost equation.

As far as Reliance is concerned, I have no doubt it’ll do a stellar job of keeping costs low. After all, it was selected over half a dozen real engineering companies primarily to recycle offsets into profits for Dassault. Not really a lot of hope for local value addition.

journo’s BS. Do you think ppl that declared Rafale L1 were stupid enough not to see that?

Would these be the very same people that cancelled the MMRCA program? I imagine they (foolishly) assumed that the price tag for the then ‘unpriced’ items would be reasonable. Scorpene redux.

Also, for your information, it wasn’t just one journalist who reported the issues (unless of course, they ‘conspired’ to cook up the story) –

C. Manmohan Reddy (Apr 2014):

Cost of aircraft

A request for proposals (RfP) finally went out on July 28, 2007 for 126 Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCAs), with an option for 63 more. Rs.42,000 crore, then worth approximately $10.25 billion, was budgeted to purchase the 126 aircraft. Recent reports indicate that the short-listed Rafales are now expected to cost over $20 billion, not least because of nearly 50 “miscellaneous” items that were left unpriced as part of the original French bid. Not only will the 126 aircraft cost about twice as much in dollar terms as originally budgeted for, depreciation of the rupee with respect to the dollar since the RfP was issued from less than 41 to over 60 will force us to effectively pay about three times as much, nearly Rs.120,000 crore, just in initial acquisition costs with over Rs.30,000 crore of that paid up front.

Rahul Bedi (Sep 2014):

In what appears to be a rerun of the Scorpene project, around 50-60 ‘un-priced’ items are believed to have been listed as miscellaneous’ in Dassault’s offer for the Rafale which emerged as L1 or the lowest bidder in the MMRCA tender ahead of the Eurofighter.

MoD sources claim that it is these sundry articles that have emerged as the principal financial hurdle in negotiating the Rafale deal on the basis of its Life Cycle Cost based on keeping the fighter operational for four decades.

It appears that subsequent pricing by Dassault of these so-called miscellaneous but critical items — like in the Scorpene tender — in its deliberations with the MoD’s Cost Negotiation Committee, are responsible for significantly inflating the Rafale contract cost, jeopardising the vendors L1 status and delaying its closure.

Ajai Shukla (Feb 2015):

Dassault had submitted a sketchy commercial bid, and when the CNC obtained details from the French company to arrive at the actual cost of the Rafale, the figures added up to significantly more than had originally been estimated.

The confusion is due partly to MoD inexperience with “life cycle costing” (LCC). The global tender for 126 medium multi-role combat aircraft (MMRCA) was the first time the MoD was awarding a contract based on LCC. This meant the winner would not be the fighter with the cheapest purchase price; instead the chosen fighter would be the one that was cheaper to buy, fly, maintain and overhaul over its 30-40 year service life.

“An inexperienced MoD, working off incomplete and sketchy details provided by Dassault, had incorrectly adjudged the Rafale cheaper. Now, after three years of obtaining clear figures from the French, we find India would be paying significantly more than had been initially calculated,” says an official in the CNC.

the thing being, with the US you can forget about any significant ToT, as it’s been demonstrated in brasilian market for example, where Hillary said “appropriate” ToT, which means, they’ll allow you to get very little, and pretty much what they consider either useless or outdated.

Or you could take the example of South Korea which received 21 out of the 25 technologies requested.

On the other hand, the Gripen, besides having US content inside, is in a league under, more comparable to the Tejas, and I doubt that India will introduce a competitor to its own aircraft, unless they plan to cancel the whole Tejas project.

With the Tejas Mk1A in development, the Tejas Mk2 is more or less shelved. The Gripen E faces no local competition.

Now, if you get back to rafale, the cost proposed for 126 aircraft in MMRCA was quite appealing

Oh you can’t be serious!!! 😀

The final estimate of the whole deal was upwards of $30 billion, a figure the govt balked at.

while including ToT and setting a production line in India… with the 36 fighters deal, it looks like part of that has been paid for indirectly (through offsets).. the price Dassault may be able to propose could very well be very competitive per aircraft as most if not all infrastructures needed may be built or in th emaking from the previous deal… something other competitors can’t spare in their offers

Dassault certainly has the edge over Boeing and Saab. Lockheed Martin on the other hand is offering to transfer an existing production line, unlike the others who’ll have to build a brand new one for India, giving it a substantial cost advantage. It should also be able to offer some good deals on refurbished aircraft.

Now, I don’t say “it is a done deal”, but that there are indications that Dassault may have gotten its way through to a bigger market in India

Its in a good position no doubt.

Well, when the F-22 starts flying against the F-35 it will be a difference. Do I really need to explain why?

Erm.. the issue was actually about how the F-35 (featuring LO attributes similar to the F-22) was dominant in training but hadn’t been pitted against an IRST equipped fighter. Msphere felt that was by design, thus implying that IRSTs would change the equation.

If you want to compare F-35 flyaway costs (for partners) please compare them with Rafale flyaway costs for France. They are documented on french senate website http://www.senat.fr/rap/a13-158-8/a13-158-814.html ; VAT included. Do not compare with export prices (including licenses etc.) including 50% offset, free training etc. Apples and oranges.

First of all, the ‘bare bones’ cost of the Rafale is very blatantly a reference to the flyaway cost for an export customer. Lets not twist that into what it is not. And it has nothing to do with offsets or free training (‘licensing’ is not part of the deal) all which will be included under different headers, most likely the €1.7 ‘customization’ cost.

The comparable figure for an export customer for the F-35 meanwhile is also not the US DoD specified flyaway cost. As with any FMS sale, there will be a 3% service charge. More importantly there will be a substantial Nonrecurring Cost (NC) to recoup the R&D investment. That figure will shrink as the number of aircraft produced increases and can be waived by the DSCA in various cases. For 2014, that figure for the F-35A was ~$15 mil. (The NC figure will be revised and updated again in 2019.)

So yes, by decade end the F-35A will be cheaper than the Rafale… there’s no getting around that fact. But for an FMS customer the difference in unit costs will be relatively slim ($5-10 mil). [Unless the DoD waives NC charges.]

for as long primary attacks consist of throwing metal pieces at each other, performance will remain the primary attribute of a fighter,

Fortunately, primary attacks don’t ‘consist of throwing metal pieces at each other’. A missile is a self-propelling maneuverable munition with a smart seeker, not a dumb chunk of metal.

Being launched with a good energy state (primarily altitude) is still important, but the gap between fighter jets in the respect is relatively narrow. The real primary attribute of the a fighter is where it stands relative to its foe on the OODA loop.

So you completely agree with me. In that case, why are you arguing, & specifying particular fighters?

Err… you replied to my post.

The purchase of fighters (any fighters) was rejected on cost grounds. That’s the reality, & specifying particular fighters just makes it look as if you think that the rejection was because of the type. It fooled me.

And those ‘grounds’ would have been exacerbated in the event of a Rafale selection. That’s what my original post said/implied/insinuated/whatever.

F-35 can’t offer much here.. The Swiss landscape is unique and their jet pilots are specially trained to use the valleys and hills to sneak upon the incoming enemy.. Stealth or no stealth plays a minor difference here.. Range, OTOH, is a different story, especially the supersonic figure..

If that were really the case, it would render the entire Swiss evaluation a farce.

None of the parameters on which the aircraft were evaluated come into play if the pilots are buzzing around in valleys and only emerging for pop up attacks. BVR isn’t a factor and strike isn’t a factor, which means the Rafale/EF are not significantly better than a (HMD equipped) Mirage/F-16 in that role.

Also, with the advent of standoff weaponry the enemy doesn’t need to arrive at the scene to complete his attack. Any SwAF will have go out and make fight off it. Of course, it is still much easier to be sneaky when you’re flying a stealth aircraft.