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Babcock, the international aerospace, defence, and security company, has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Israel Aerospace Industries’ (IAI) Group and Subsidiary ELTA Systems to provide a deep-find radar solution for the UK Ministry of Defence’s SERPENS programme.

SERPENS is the MoD’s next generation weapon locating system with a digitally networked suite of sensor systems that detect hostile mortars, artillery and rockets. The collaboration will offer IAI-ELTA’s highly capable, and battle proven Compact Multi Mission Radar (C-MMR) system, which will be partly produced and integrated in the UK.

DE&S have awarded a £46 million contract to extend the British Army’s use of its Mobile Artillery Monitoring Battlefield Asset (MAMBA) weapon-locating radar systems.

The contract secures the continued use of the life-saving critical operational counter-fire capability that has been in service since 2003, supporting operations in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

The contract, awarded to SAAB by the Artillery Systems team at DE&S, will see the company work with the Royal Artillery’s 5th regiment based in Catterick, to ensure the capability remains in service until 2026.

I.1) Name, addresses and contact point(s)

Official name: Ministry of Defence, Land Equipment, Armoured Vehicles Programmes — Artillery Systems Programme
Postal address: Artillery Systems PT, DE&S Abbey Wood, CEDAR 2C (#3260)

II.1) Title attributed to the contract by the contracting authority/entity:

Serpens

II.4) Short description of nature and scope of works or nature and quantity or value of supplies or services:

The Army HQ Single Statement of User Need (SSUN) which Serpens will deliver against is: ‘The user requires and organic, responsive, persistent, protected and mobile suite of networked systems optimised to detect, acquire, track and assess adversary indirect fire threats at ranges available to peer opponents. These systems must be survivable on the modern battlefield, deployable with all land forces and linked autonomously to both future ISTAR architectures and effectors, in order to support effectively the counter fires battle within the warfighting division and the Light, Strike and Armoured Infantry Brigades.’

The main Users are 1 Arty Brigade and 1 ISR Brigade. The in service date for Serpens is 2026 with an anticipated out of service date of 2057.

Serpens is a category a equipment procurement project taking into account the through life costs.

This Prior Information Notice (PIN) is to inform the market of the Authority’s intention to procure the Serpens capability.

II.6) Scheduled date for start of award procedures and duration of the contract

Scheduled date for start of award procedures: 1.7.2024

II.7) Additional information:

Serpens will deliver a digitally networked suite of sensor systems to detect hostile mortars, artillery and rockets within the Land Environment. It will comprise part of the wider Land Environment Tactical ISTAR (LE Tac ISTAR) capability (an Army programme in its own right) and from the outset will be conceived with clearly defined architectures to allow seamless operation within land, joint and NATO ISTAR constructs. It has key dependencies and interactions with: Land Environment Tactical CIS (LE Tac CIS), the primary voice and data bearer. ZODIAC, the future Land ISTAR architecture. Divisional Deep Fires Programme, the ability to strike deep targets with precision. Close Support Fires Programme, the provision of close fires to the Land Environment.

The existing weapon locating capabilities: Mobile Artillery Monitoring Battlefield Radar (MAMBA), Advanced Sound-ranging Post (ASP) and the Lightweight Counter Mortar Radar (LCMR) reach their OSD in 2026. Should they not be replaced, this will result in the loss of a significant target acquisition capability at a time when Land Forces require enhanced weapon locating sensors as part of the divisional counter fires battle.

Belangrijke wijzigingen

De eerste radars zijn door Thales-Nederland aan Defensie geleverd. Binnen het project is de bestelling van
Noorwegen opgehoogd van vijf naar acht systemen; deze leveringen vinden plaats voor eind 2025.

Het project is uitgebreid met 9 extra systemen voor Nederland. Levering van deze systemen is voorzien in 2026 en 2027. Inmiddels hebben Denemarken en Litouwen ook MMR’s besteld en zijn er gesprekken met het Verenigd Koninkrijk.

Project Description

Defence Equipment & Support (DE&S), as the procurement arm of the Ministry of Defence (MoD), is engaged in procurement activity for Project SERPENS, a digitally integrated weapon locating system, to be employed as counterbattery assets comprising artillery weapon locating sensors and radars which will be installed onto in-service land vehicles and integrated with communications bearer networks. The planned out-of-service date (OSD) for the SERPENS system is 2057.

SERPENS plans to procure a quantity of twenty-five (25) Close Find Radars using a competitive flexible procedure (s.20) under a staged delivery schedule to complete during calendar year 2027. Please note, quantity/ies are subject to change.

Focus is on high technological readiness with priority on key requirements following which development will focus on the mounting of radar assets onto vehicles, integration with in-service comms bearer/s and, in future, integration into SERPENS as a networked array of sensors. The planned core term for this contracting opportunity will be six (6) years, estimating equipment deliveries within no more than two (2) years followed by four (4) years of in-service support. Options are planned to be implemented to extend the in-service support beyond the core six-year term as a de-risking measure based on the complexity of system integration requirements for the SERPENS system.

Contract Start Date

29/05/2026

Contract Duration

6 Years (+4 Option Years)

Estimated Value of Contract

£94000000