industry information > aerospace defence & homeland security > Transatlantic Market

SBAC works closely with its sister organisation in the US, the AIA, on issues of mutual interest to improve UK-US trade and cooperation and export control reform is a high priority for the two organisations. On 7 March 2007 AIA was one of eight US trade associations ? the Coalition for Security and Competitiveness ? that wrote to President Bush arguing that ?export control modernization is needed and ... the opportunity is now.' The letter made clear that American industry supported protecting US 'sensitive military technologies from our adversaries and rivals, while also maximizing the benefits of trade and technology cooperation with our allies and friends.' The Coalition provided a number of specific proposals that could be implemented by the President without recourse to Congress.

The Coalition continues its work today and its website can be accessed at: http://securityandcompetitiveness.org/

On 12 December 2006 the UK and US signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on the production, sustainment and follow-on development phase of the JSF programme. The MoU sets out the framework for purchasing JSF and supporting and upgrading it through life. It also provides for the pooling of the partner nations' collective buying power in a common support solution, and of their resources and technology in follow-on development. With the signing of the MoU the UK committed another £34 million to the project and, although the document does not formally commit Britain to buying any aircraft, MoD plans to procure 150 Short Take-Off, Vertical Landing (STOVL) variant JSFs.

British companies are closely involved in the programme and over 100 firms have already won development contracts. Companies are now able to compete for work in the next phase and the expected value of work for the UK is over $29 billion. The website of the JSF UK Industry Team ? an informal alliance of companies committed to the JSF programme ? can be accessed at: http://www.jsf.org.uk/team.htm

On 21 June 2007 President Bush and then Prime Minister Tony Blair signed a US-UK Defence Trade Cooperation Treaty designed to strengthen bilateral defence industrial cooperation between the two countries. The signature marked, in effect, the conclusion of an initial agreement and discussions over some of the Treaty's specific provisions are yet to be finalised. Once the terms of the Treaty are concluded, the accord is expected to reduce barriers in the exchange of defence goods, services and information between the US and UK. Additional information will appear here as implementation of the Treaty progresses.

The Defence Industries Council response to the signing of the Treaty can be downloaded below.

Defence Industries Council Welcomes UK-US Defence Trade Cooperation Treaty (52.5 KB)

In 2006 NATO tasked the NATO Industrial Advisory Group (NIAG) to undertake a study on Trans-Atlantic Defence Industrial Cooperation, following on from a similar assessment in 2002.

NIAG was asked to 'identify measures in relation to export licensing issues and other best practices which allies and defence companies could implement to bring about improvements in the achievement of Trans-Atlantic Defence Industrial Cooperation to support Alliance defence capability transformation'. A second objective was to 'develop a proposed high level political declaration ... for consideration by CNAD as a possible contribution to the NATO 2008 Summit.'

SBAC has contributed to the industry team that has undertaken this work and the preliminary findings have now been presented to the CNAD. Please find below a summary of the study's draft conclusions.

NIAG Study 2007 (24.4 KB)