China's Norinco Moves Closer to Indonesian Sky Dragon Sale

Norinco Sky Dragon 50 medium SAM (Norinco)

China North Industries Corporation (NORINCO) is close to securing a deal from Indonesia to supply its Sky Dragon 50 medium-range surface-to-air missile (SAM) system, it has emerged.

A NORINCO official told IHS Jane's at the Indo Defence 2016 exhibition in Jakarta on 2 November that the state-owned company has recently submitted a proposal to supply the Sky Dragon to the Indonesian Air Force and that the service has "successfully completed" field evaluations of the system.

"We are now waiting for the official bidding process to start," said a NORINCO official, although he did not disclose the scope of the air force requirement.

IHS Jane's has previously reported that a Sky Dragon battery consists of an IBIS150 3D target designation radar, a fire distribution vehicle, and three to six launch vehicles, each armed with four ready-to-fire missiles carried in container-launcher tubes of circular cross-section. In this configuration, a battery will be capable of engaging up to 12 targets simultaneously and firing all 12 individually targeted missiles in seconds.

The official said that NORINCO is competing to supply the Sky Dragon against comparative systems from rival but unidentified companies. However, he stressed that the NORINCO product has several factors in its favour, most importantly price.

"We believe this system is much easier to operate than rival air defence systems," he said. "There is no major training programme required for the Sky Dragon and the rockets are supported by an advanced active radar seeker, which increases accuracy significantly. Also, the Sky Dragon is about 40% cheaper than some other medium-range air defence systems."

The official added that NORINCO has been active in Indonesia "about 20 years" supplying mainly the Indonesian Army and Indonesian Navy with "rockets and air defence" products.

 ♖ IHS Janes