Should South Africa order any type of Airbus Military aircraft, the company would be willing to allow South African involvement in their support.

"We know the capabilities of the South African industry," Airbus Military Customer Services head Philippe Galland pointed out to Engineering News Online. "We'd be willing to partner with them in maintenance, if the customer wants."

Airbus Military now offers a series of full in-service support (FISS) packages for all its aircraft, of which the basic version is Material FISS, which is focused on the supply of spares, parts and associated services. Mission FISS adds maintenance (excluding first-line maintenance). Now under development, the Fleet FISS package will provide even more comprehensive support to the customer.

Ideally, of course, Airbus Military would like to be the prime contractor in a FISS package. "[But] we have different models for different customers. We are flexible," affirmed Galland. "We have the ambition to offer FISS ourselves. We know our machines! But we are willing to work with partners, whatever the level – it could be MRO [maintenance, repair and overhaul]."

Thus, for the support of French Air Force CN235s, the company has a partnership with a French private-sector MRO company, which is a subcontractor to Airbus Military. For French A400Ms, the manufacturer will have a partnership with a State-owned MRO facility.

Perhaps a more striking example is Airbus Military's partnership with the Advanced Military Maintenance Repair Overhaul Centre (Ammroc) in the United Arab Emirates. (Ammroc is a joint venture between Abu Dhabi State-owned group Mubadala and two US companies, Sikorsky and Lockheed Martin.)

"Clearly, this is an Emirates entity," he noted. "They are the prime contractor for FISS [for the A330 Multirole Tanker Transports for the United Arab Emirates Air Force]. We support them [Ammroc]. That was the wish if not the requirement of the Emirates government, that we were happy to follow. We are happy to serve the customer."

The South African Air Force currently operates a small number of Airbus Military C212 light transport aircraft, but Galland pointed out that the European company has no maintenance contract regarding these aircraft – their maintenance is done in South Africa.

* Keith Campbell attended the Airbus Military Trade Media Briefing 2013 in Seville, Spain, as a guest of the company.