France Greatly Lowered Rafale Price For lndia: Dassault CEO

France has “greatly” lowered the price of the Rafale fighter jet for India and all requirements (concerning technical, financial and offsets) have been met, CEO of Dassault Aviation, Eric Trappier said today.

In an interview to French publication Les Echos, Trappier said that we (meaning the French government which is negotiating the government-to-government deal) are ready to enter at any time (to sign the contract) since the ball in the camp of the Indian government.

He asserted that there is no need for a bank guarantee in the Rafale deal for India since there is a state guarantee. “With India, it is an inter-governmental agreement, state to state, which means that France agrees industrial deliveries in due time.”

In reply to a question, he said that the negotiations were started as India needed aircraft urgently. In the past, whenever India has entered into a into conflict, she has used French aircraft: namely the Mirage from Dassault. India therefore knows that it can count on France and Dassault. And most recently, it has entered into a contract with Dassault for the modernization of the  Mirage aircraft.

Eric Trappier’s statement seems to indicate that the negotiation have come to a standstill and that France has made its final offer after lowering the price in relation to the price it has sold in the international market.