PARIS, Nov. 30 (UPI) -- A consortium of Thales, Sagem and the Nexter Group will lead architecture development of the French land forces modernization program known as Scorpion.
The contract for the work, awarded by the French Ministry of Defense's Directorate General of Armaments, is worth nearly $28 million, the companies said in a joint statement.
To carry out the work, the three French firms are creating a task-dedicated company, Master of Architecture of Scorpion, which will work in close partnership with the DGA.
The Scorpion project involves development and acquisition of about 1,000 new, multirole armored vehicles to replace current wheeled armored personnel vehicles in 2016. About 70 new armored reconnaissance combat vehicles will also enter service by 2019 and Leclerc tanks will be modernized.
The program also includes the fielding of a new battle command system -- Scorpion Information Combat Systems.
The three firms will finalize design of the program's system architecture, leading to the government announcing contracts for specific vehicle development work in two years.
