- Nexter, Arquus and Thales have presented the 500th GRIFFON armored multi-role vehicle (VBMR) and the 50th JAGUAR armored reconnaissance and combat vehicle (EBRC) to the French defense procurement agency (Direction Générale de l'Armement);
- The three manufacturers, grouped together under the Groupement Momentané d'Entreprises (GME) engin blindé multi-rôles (EBMR), are meeting their contractual targets under the EBMR contract, which calls for a total of 1,872 GRIFFONs and 300 JAGUARs to be in service.
Manufacturing and assembly at Nexter
Nexter, a KNDS company, manufactures the aluminum armored body, the internal fittings of the vehicles and the turret of the JAGUAR in Roanne. Thanks to Nexter's high-precision machining and robotized welding technologies, the welded aluminum body structure of the GRIFFON and JAGUAR vehicles offers the best protection performance for the military. Nexter is also the manufacturer of the JAGUAR's 40mm cannon and telescoped ammunition, produced at Bourges and La Chapelle Saint-Ursin.
Other Nexter sites and subsidiaries supply certain equipment for these vehicles, such as CBRN protection made by NBC-Sys in Saint-Chamond, on-board electronics and computers in Toulouse, and vision equipment produced by OPT-Sys in Saint-Etienne. Finally, Nexter carries out the final assembly and integration of the vehicles, using all these components as well as those produced by Arquus and Thales.
Arquus expert in EBMR vehicle mobility
Arquus designs and produces the complete powertrains for the two GRIFFON and JAGUAR vehicles, i.e. all the parts and components required for their mobility function: trains, suspensions, powertrain.
Produced at the Arquus site in Limoges, Centre d'Excellence de Production de Véhicules Neufs, these complete mobility kits are then delivered to Nexter, which is in charge of integrating them on the Roanne production line for the GME EBMR.
The engines powering the EBMRs are produced at the Marolles-en-Hurepoix site, the Arquus Engine Militarization Center of Excellence. An Arquus team of around twenty experts is permanently on hand in Roanne, alongside our partners, to provide technical and quality expertise on all these components.
At its Marolles-en-Hurepoix site, Arquus also produces the T1, T2 and T3 remotely-operated turrets (TTOs), the so-called common components of the SCORPION program, which equip the GRIFFON and JAGUAR, as well as the SERVAL.
Interconnected vehicles from Thales
Thales supplies onboard electronic systems ("vetronics") enabling networking and data enhancement for collaborative platform engagement. This includes Scorpion common vetronics, sensors, secure communication solutions and self-protection devices based on collaborative combat algorithms.
Thales is also responsible for the payload and radars of the Véhicule d'Observation de l'Artillerie (VOA).
This architecture and these computers link all navigation, protection, observation and communication systems to give units a decisive advantage in theater, by extending their intelligence and intervention capabilities.
