Hawkei

The Hawkei is an Australian light four-wheel-drive protected mobility vehicle. Originally designed in 2010 to meet an Australian Defence Force (ADF) requirement for a light armoured patrol vehicle to replace some of its Land Rover Perentie variants. The Hawkei is a highly mobile, highly protected, 7-tonne vehicle, with inbuilt systems to allow it to be used as a fighting platform. It has been developed with Vehicle Electronic Architecture to be mission system ready.

It is intended to undertake a range of mission profiles, including troop movement, command and control, electronic warfare, liaison, surveillance and reconnaissance. Prime contractors include: Thales Australia, Boeing Australia, Plasan (Israel) and PAC Group. In October 2015, the Australian Government announced the purchase of 1,100 Hawkei vehicles from Thales Australia.

History
As part of a wider project to replace the ADF's fleet of operational support vehicles, Project Land 121 Phase 4 – Protected Mobility Vehicle (Light) or PMV-L, is a requirement for up to 1,300 specialised light armoured vehicles to replace some of the in-service Land Rovers. Key criteria for the project included: off-road mobility, integrated vehicle electronic architecture, substantial payloads, high levels of protection against land mines, improvised explosive devices and ballistic weapons, while being light enough to be airlifted by military helicopters. The three options considered as part of the project were:
 * Option 1, Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV) Program - align the PMV-L requirement to the United States JLTV program to replace its fleet of High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle or 'Humvee' (awarded 25 August 2015 to Oshkosh offering L-ATV);
 * Option 2, Manufactured and Supported in Australia (MSA); and
 * Option 3, Market available – pursuit of this option is subject to Australian Government decisions on Options 1 and 2.

Competitors for the MSA option included the combat-proven MOWAG Eagle IV from General Dynamics Land Systems; the British military then selected Ocelot from Force Protection; and the Hawkei offering from Thales Australia. The JLTV option included entries from BAE Systems/Navistar, AM General/General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin.

In December 2011 the Department of Defence (DoD) announced Hawkei as the preferred vehicle for further development and testing under the MSA option.

In October 2015, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Minister for Defence Marise Payne announced the purchase of 1,100 Hawkei vehicles and trailers at a cost of $1.3 billion with the Hawkei to be manufactured at Thales's facility in Bendigo. The purchase includes 1058 trailers designed by Schutt Industries and manufactured by Thales at their facility in Eagle Farm. Two variants of the Hawkei will be purchased: a 4-door variant and a 2-door utility variant. The 4-door variant will be able to be configured using a mission-kit for three roles: Command, Liaison and Reconnaissance. 635 4-door variants and 465 2-door variants will be purchased.

In September 2018, the Australian National Audit Office released a report which criticised aspects of the Hawkei project. The report judged that Australia should have remained in the JLTV program to provide competition for the Hawkei procurement and that the Department of Defence had not kept ministers fully informed about the Hawkei program. This included not providing ministers with a study which found that there were few benefits from building the vehicles in Australia. The ANAO was unable to publish some elements of the audit after Attorney General Christian Porter ruled that publishing it would compromise national security. Thales had taken legal action earlier in the year seeking to have material removed from the report. Some of the suppressed elements of the report were released in 2021 following a freedom of information request, and included material stating that the Department of Defence had been unable to demonstrate that the Hawkei represented value for money compared to the JLTV.

In December 2018, the Hawkei faced reliability issues following a demonstration test conducted on 19 November 2018, delaying full-rate production.

In September 2020, Defence Minister Linda Reynolds and Defence Industry Minister Melissa Price announced that the Hawkei would enter full-rate production at Thales's facility in Bendigo at approximately 50 vehicles per month.

In November 2020, the DoD temporarily suspended the use of the Hawkei fleet until an issue with the anti-lock braking system (ABS) was found. In July 2021, Defence Minister Peter Dutton and Defence Industry Minister Melissa Price announced that Thales had developed a fix for the braking issue.

In March 2022, the production of the 1,000th Hawkei was completed by Thales.

In November 2022, Thales advised the DoD that it had identified a new issue with the Hawkei's brakes. As a result the DoD banned the Hawkei from use on civilian roads and imposed a 40 km/h maximum speed limit on their use. Thales developed an interim solution with the ABS modulator on every Hawkei changed every ten months on a sample fleet of 125 vehicles. In July 2024, Defence Industry Minister Pat Conroy and Brigadier John-Paul Ouvrier announced that Thales had resolved the Hawkei's ABS issues and that there would be a remediation program to install the fixes.

Variants
All variants use the same four wheeled platform.

4 door
Dual cab with a crew of four to six, weapons system options including up to 12.7mm guns or 40 mm grenade systems in various mounts with a remote operated option.

The 4-doors variants include the following sub variants:


 * Liaison: vehicle with general communication equipment, up to 4 personnel
 * Command: vehicle with additional integrated electronic command, control and communication systems, up to 4 personnel
 * Reconnaissance: vehicle equipped for light infantry, reconnaissance and Air Force security missions, up to 4 personnel.

2 door
Single-extended cab with a flat-bed cargo area measuring; L: 2000 mm x W: 2400 mm. The vehicle has a crew of 2–3 and has a kerb weight of 6800 kg with a rated cargo load of 3000 kg. The load bed is designed to accommodate four 1000mm × 1200mm (40" x 48") NATO standard military pallets or a single tricon (one-third ISO 20 ft) container.

Border Protection
Dual cab with a crew of four to six, various equipment options including force protection radar, surveillance and communications systems.

Special Operations Vehicle
Dual cab manned by a crew of four to six with up to three weapon systems: Options included full doors, half doors, windscreen and scalable racking system for payload.
 * Front co-driver swing mount;
 * Roof mounted manual gunring or remote weapon station; and/or
 * Rear-facing swing mount.

Etymology
The Hawkei is named after Acanthophis hawkei, a species of death adder. In turn, the snake is named after former Prime Minister of Australia Bob Hawke.

Operators

 * 🇦🇺 Australia - Australian Army: 423 Hawkei as of June 2023 (1,100 ordered).

Potential operators

 * 🇨🇦 Canada
 * The Canadian Army is looking for a successor of the Mercedes G-Wagon and Chevrolet Silverado under the Light Utility Vehicle (LUV) project.
 * The project has a budget of $250 to 499 million Canadian dollars, it is expected to be implemented in 2027 or 2028, and the delivery to start in 2028 or 2029, until 2031 or 2032.
 * Several vehicles are being considered.
 * Roshel probably with the Senator which is already being manufactured in Canada, and being supplied by Canada to Ukraine.
 * Thales Hawkei which was observed ongoing testing in Canada in April 2020.


 * 🇯🇵 Japan
 * On August 5, 2022, it was reported in Japan that Mitsubishi Heavy Industries may manufacture the Hawkei under licence from Thales in case the contract is awarded to them for the JGSDF. It's marketed to replace the Komatsu LAV. The Hawkei and the Mowag Eagle V were ordered in limited quantity for trials in 2023, and were observed on public roads in Japan.


 * 🇬🇧 United Kingdom
 * Thales UK is offering the Bushmaster and the Hawkei for the Land Mobility Programme.
 * The Hawkei would be part of the Light Protected Mobility category, whose role would consist of command and liaison, command and control, patrol tasks, ISTAR, GBAD, CBRN, tactical support and utility. This category will replace the Stormer HVM, FV430 Bulldog, Iveco LMV (Panther) and the Foxhound.

Failed bids

 * 🇫🇷 France and 🇧🇪 Belgium
 * THE VBAE programme (Véhicule Blindé d’Aide à Engagement) is a future light armoured vehicle in collaboration between France and Belgium. For the French Army, it will replace the VBL.
 * The Thales Hawkei was one of the competitors.
 * In December 2023 OCCAR signed a cooperation agreement with Arquus, Nexter (KNDS France) and John Cockerill to pre-design a contender for the VBAE programme. In July 2024, the development was approved and therefore, unless major changes, the Scarabee will become the VBAE.


 * 🇵🇱 Poland
 * The Thales Hawkei was one of the four finalists of the Pegaz Programme. This programme was initially planned in two phases. The first phase intended to equip the special operations forces and the military police with 4×4 to participate in missions such as patrol, intervention, counter-terrorism and reconnaissance scenarios. In the longer run, the winner of the competition was intended to become the new multi-purpose 4×4 of the Polish Army.
 * The pre-selected vehicles were the Fortress Mk2 (French), Thales Hawkei (Australia), Patriot II (Polish / Czech) and Tur V.
 * In 2021, the programme was cancelled. This programme could have resulted in an initial purchase of 50 vehicles, and as many as 700 over the long term.