Breaking news
GE' F414-GE-400 engine selected for South Korea KF-X fighter program.
| a | |||
|
|
|||
|
World Defense & Security Industry News - General Electric
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
GE' F414-GE-400 engine selected for South Korea KF-X fighter program
|
|||
|
According to the korean news agency Yonhap, the U.S. company General Electric (GE) was selected on Thursday as the preferred bidder to supply engines for South Korea's next-generation fighter jets, Seoul's state arms procurement agency said. GE has been picked as the supplier for the Korean Fighter Experimental (KF-X) program, according to the Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA).
|
|||
|
|
|||
 GE has been selected to provide its F414 engine for South Korea's KF-X next-gen fighter program |
|||
|
|
|||
|
European engine maker Eurojet Turbo GmbH and GE had been vying to become the engine provider for the 18 trillion won (US$15.3 billion) project that calls for building 120 locally made twin-engine combat jets.
Seoul aims to deploy the new planes starting in the mid-2020s to replace its aging jet fleet of F-4s and F-5s. The DAPA said that it plans to clinch a contract with GE next month after holding negotiations over the terms of the deal. It earlier said that it will seek to finalize the basic designs for the plane by September next year and come up with a detailed design by January 2019. As part of efforts to push for the project, the DAPA last month selected domestic defense manufacturer Hanwha Thales as a preferred bidder to produce an advanced radar system to be installed onto the fighter jets. South Korea had initially planned to secure 25 fighter jet technologies from U.S. aerospace giant Lockheed Martin in an offset deal linked to Seoul's purchase of the company's 40 F-35 Lightning II fighters in 2014. But the U.S. government refused last year to approve the export of four core technologies, forcing South Korea to find an alternative supplier or build them in-house. The four technologies are those linked to an active electronically scanned radar array, infrared search and tracking system, electronics optics targeting pod and a radio frequency jammer. South Korea has been speeding up the development of its home-grown missile defense systems set to be completed by 2023 -- Kill Chain and Korean Air and Missile Defense -- which could detect and intercept missiles coming from North Korea. |
|||