Dassault, Airbus Team Awarded Future Combat Air System Demo Phase Contract

The team lead by French Dassault and German Airbus have been awarded a contract  by their respective governments to launch demonstrator phase for the Future Combat Air System (FCAS).

"The governments of France and Germany have awarded  Dassault Aviation, Airbus, together with their partners MTU Aero Engines, Safran, MBDA and Thales, the initial framework contract (Phase 1A), which launches the demonstrator phase for the Future Combat Air System (FCAS)," Dassault said in a statement Thursday.

This framework contract covers a first period of 18 months and initiates work on developing the demonstrators and maturing technologies, with the ambition to begin flight tests as soon as 2026.

Since early 2019, the industrial partners have been working on the future architecture as part of the programme’s so called Joint Concept Study. Now, the FCAS programme enters into another decisive phase with the launch of the demonstrator phase.

This phase will, in a first step, focus on the main technological challenges per domains:

* Next Generation Fighter (NGF), with Dassault Aviation as prime contractor and Airbus as main partner, to be the core element of Future Combat Air System,

A Simulation Environment will be jointly developed between the involved companies to ensure the consistency between demonstrators.

The next important step in the FCAS programme will be the onboarding of Spain and the involvement of additional suppliers from Phase 1B onwards, which will succeed Phase 1A after its successful conclusion.