Defence Business: Marshall Land Systems increases Australian footprint | ADM September 2012

Marshall Land Systems, manufacturers of Military Off The Shelf deployable systems, is stepping up its presence in Australia with the recent appointment of Iain Watt as Head of Business Development of Marshall Land Systems Australia (MLSA).

Watt will be co-located with the Business Development Team of Tectonica Australia in Melbourne. Marshall Land Systems Tectonica are partners in an agreement to offer Protected Workspace solutions in Australia and the Asia Pacific region. His appointment in July coincided with a visit to Australia by Chief Executive Peter Callaghan, for talks with Defence and industry representatives regarding opportunities for co-operation on several major Defence projects.

Callaghan said that Marshall Land Systems had been active in Australia for some time and he saw significant opportunity for further business over the next few years.

“In Australia we’ve been bidding on Land 121 since 2008, starting with load carrying systems and now evolved to the modules. We have a teaming agreement with Thales on the modules,” he said. “We’ve worked with Rheinmetall-MAN Military Vehicles for quite a long time and we’re partnered with them in the UK for the MoD Support Vehicle program, which is quite similar to Land 121, and we’re working with other major suppliers.”

Marshall Land Systems specialises in the design, production and integration of military equipment, such as command and communications modules, for installation on existing vehicles and has supplied over 110,000 military logistics systems around the world.

It also produces modular protected work spaces, which can be deployed and set up to provide highly complex facilities such as those required for specialised medical care or laboratories, Command and Control centres and the like.

“We’re looking at Land 121 as our entry point to build a module business in Australia,” Callaghan said. “We’re not looking to displace existing suppliers; we think there’s a gap for us in the marketplace. There is a rising demand, as a consequence of tactical transport requirements and the need for more electronics systems into protected workspaces.”

The company is working with Rheinmetall- MAN on Land 121 Phase 3B (Protected and Unprotected Medium and Heavy Vehicles) and Callaghan says there are also opportunities identified for work on Phase 4 (Protected Mobility Vehicle – Light) and Phase 5B (Medium and Heavy Tactical Training Vehicles) of the project.

“We are working with Thales Australia to develop the load carrying system for the utility version of Hawkei for Phase 4. We did similar work on the Bushmaster ute and we’ve also worked on the UK’s Force Protection Foxhound utility variant,” he said.

“We’ve had around 20 of our people visit Australia since 2008 for Land 121, some of them more than once,” he explained. “That’s been a deliberate program to engage our project managers, systems engineers and procurement people with Australian standards and the local way of doing things.”

Beyond Land 121

Beyond Land 121, Callaghan sees an opportunity to bid for elements of JP2060 (Deployable Health Capability), pointing to the Role 1, Role 2 and Role 3 hospitals and laboratories Marshall Land Systems has developed to conform to UK, Norwegian and European healthcare standards.

“There’s also JP2072 (Battlespace Communications System), which is a very similar program to one which we’ve done in the UK and another for the Swedish Army,” he said.

Callaghan said that he was mindful of developing Australian Industry Capability, should MLSA win further work in the country.

“One of the reasons for my visit is to meet with the AIC people in Canberra and we’re quite clear on what AIC means to us. We’re very confident we can satisfy their requirements,” he said. “We source internationally now and what we intend to do in Australia is to bring our project engineering, design and system skills here. Some people will come from the UK, but we intend growing our own Australian workforce.”

There have been no decisions made on where MLSA will be based, but it will depend largely on where the various project elements it is interested in will be required to be delivered.

Callaghan said that Marshall Land Systems was rated as the number one supplier to the UK MoD in terms of performance, with a rating of 9.2 out of 10.

“We pride ourselves on being on time and doing what we say. Our general motto is, ‘We do what we Say,” he concluded.

“Subject to making progress on Land 121 Phase 3B, I would expect to have more people talking to you than just Iain and I in 12 months from now.”