Boeing All Alone In Bid For Huge South Korean Spy Plane Deal

Another use for the 737!

Fri, 04 Aug '06
IAI Dropped From Contract Bid
Israeli Aircraft Industries is out of the running in its bid to build South Korea's next aerial surveillance platform. That leaves Boeing all alone in the race for a contract worth more than $2 billion.

That doesn't mean Boeing has actually won the contract, however... at least, not yet. The Chicago-based planemaker will now be asked by the government in Seoul to submit a bid. It seems Boeing's E-737 has all the bells and whistles the South Koreans want... so now it's time to talk dollars and cents.

If Boeing gets the contract, it'll build four radar reconnaisance planes for South Korea... to be delivered by 2012.

As for IAI... it's back to the drawing board. South Korean defense officials say its Elta Systems Group G-550 didn't meet the country's needs.

I didn't know any aircraft were built in Israel. Does IAI actually build them or do they modify planes built by other manufacturers?

IAI is primaraly a biz jet builder. They were bought by Gulfstream Aerospace about two years ago though. They build the Galexy otherwise know as the G200 and the G150 right know as well as formerly the Astra and Westwind (jet commander). I do not know if the G-150 and G-200 program as they are know now will remain in Tel Aviv at Ben Gurion or be shipped over to SAV but I am sure that it can be researched.

The Astra and Galaxy (now G150 and G200) lines are still built on the north side at TLV and ferried to DAL for interior finishing (via Shannon and Eastern Canada [YHZ/YQX]). Past IAI products like the Westwind and the Arava are no longer produced. IAI's Bedek subsidiary is the one who does all of those freighter conversions, formerly 742s, but now 744s. This is also done at TLV. They have some other modification lines going on, also, most notably the Phalcon radar system which has been done for Chile and India [707 for the former, Il-76 for the latter].