Qinetiq wins share of submarine contract

has been awarded a £3.8m contract from

following the Swedish defence giant’s success in winning a prime contract worth £18m from the Norwegian Defence Procurement Division.

The prime contract is to deliver an integrated combat system infrastructure, a new passive sonar system and an upgraded tactical simulator for Norway's six ULA Class submarines.

Qinetiq will provide its DeRSCI open architecture software infrastructure and sonar processing applications together with new data acquisition hardware that will bring together the processing system with the existing submarine sonar arrays.

The overall system will be built using COTS based hardware integrated with Qinetiq’s advanced sonar processing solutions and combined with Kongsberg’s sonar processing and combat management system capabilities.

‘This is the first opportunity that we’ve had to work alongside Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace and we’re really looking forward to jointly delivering a highly successful programme. Our aspiration is to build on the relationship and show the Royal Norwegian Navy what a great team we are,’ said Karen Oddey, managing director of Qinetiq’s Integrated Systems Sector. ‘A number of submarine fleets throughout the world are, or will soon be, in need of life extension programmes and our respective companies see this contract as a significant reference point.’

Delivery of the ULA Class upgrade will commence in 2010 and is scheduled for completion around mid 2012. The majority of Qinetiq’s work will be undertaken at its Winfrith facility in Dorset with the physical installation work being undertaken in Norway.