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Singapore firm in running for key India arms contract: report
Singapore (AFP) March 12, 2009 A state-linked Singapore firm is bidding for a key contract worth one billion Singapore dollars (650 million US) to supply mobile artillery to the Indian military, a newspaper said Thursday. The Straits Times quoted an unnamed Indian official as saying the South Asian giant's army was happy with an ultra-lightweight cannon from defence and engineering firm Singapore Technologies Kinetics (ST Kinetics). "We like the artillery," the Indian official said. ST Kinetics, the land systems and specialty vehicles arm of Singapore Technologies Engineering, confirmed it had made a bit for the contract. "We are participating in the tender which is currently at the evaluation stage," a company spokeswoman said. "As it is still under evaluation and we are bound by customer confidentiality agreements, we are unable to comment further." The report said the Indian army evaluated the Singapore-made Pegasus ultra-lightweight cannon -- said to be the first self-propelled, helicopter-portable weapon of its kind and capable of firing three rounds in 24 seconds. The contract is for 145 cannons, it said. India, which has long had uneasy relations with fellow nuclear-armed neighbour Pakistan, is looking to modernise its military hardware, in the past sourced mainly from the former Soviet Union. The Indian military has said it cannot cut defence spending even during the current financial crisis and plans to hand out contracts worth 30 billion US dollars in the next three to four years. The defence budget accounts for 2.5 percent of GDP and India has imported military hardware worth 28 billion dollars since 2000. ST Engineering is listed on the Singapore exchange and reported a turnover of 5.34 billion Singapore dollars (3.47 billion US) in 2008. It is one of the companies under state investment agency Temasek Holdings. Share This Article With Planet Earth
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US Defense Facing Massive Cash Crunch As Economy Tanks
Washington (UPI) Mar 11, 2009 This week the National Defense University and the Atlantic Council jointly hosted a major conference in Washington on the future of the Department of Defense, drawing literary license from President Obama by calling it "Audacity for Change -- Transforming How the Pentagon Conducts Its Business." Underpinning this conference was the proposition that what happened to Wall Street and Main Street -- implosion -- could well happen to the Pentagon. |
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