In the News

New Innovation in Air Defense Out of Africa

November 25, 2011

Most of the world doesn’t believe that developing nations need, or should have, defense industries.  According to Ivor Ichikowitz, with Paramount Group in South Africa, the opposite is true. “We learned very early on in Africa that the foundation for any economic growth and development was security and stability – with that comes investment and with that comes jobs and with jobs comes prosperity.  The world wants the developing world to be prosperous and if there isn’t a foundation built on security and peace, that can’t happen.”

Ichikowitz and his team at Paramount Group are currently working on a project in South Africa that he believes will revolutionize the defense aircraft industry.  The Advanced High-Performance Reconnaissance Light Aircraft (AHRLAC) will be the first of its kind and will come equipped with an affordable price tag for developing nations.  “We’re very excited about it,” Ichikowitz exclaims.  “It’s actually the first time that an aircraft of this nature has been conceived, designed, developed, and will be industrialized in South Africa.”  South Africa has manufactured components for aircraft, such as Boeing and Air Bus, for many years but never produced an entire unit on its own much less design one. 

The AHRLAC is designed to perform many of the functions of a helicopter, but at the same time be a very versatile platform. Not only can it be used for military, policing, and peacekeeping activities, but also for a lot of civilian commercial activities.

In the aviation defense industry, agencies have to purchase five aircrafts to perform five different missions. The AHRLAC changes the industry by having a base unit design, which can be customized with different components, or mission packages. The base unit can be transformed quickly and very easily for reconnaissance missions, policing missions, pipeline and border protection, defense, etc. The AHRLAC is also designed to be affordable to purchase and maintain compared to helicopters lowering the cost of ownership, depending on the level of sophistication that is demanded.

As this is a unique product, which is new to the market, the AHRLAC requires specialized parts that are not currently manufactured on a large scale.  It will create an entire ecosystem.  According to Ichikowitz, “It creates an opportunity for literally hundreds of partners and component suppliers around the world to participate on the project.”

Paramount Group is setting up a production facility in South Africa and intends to set up assembly facilities around the world.  While they are still too far out to predict how many jobs the production of these aircraft will create, they anticipate that it will add R4-5 billion (~USD500-600 million) to the South African economy annually while creating a large number of high value jobs. “In South Africa, this aircraft has the potential to completely rejuvenate the aerospace industry.  I believe that no country can emerge from a developing economy to a developed economy without high-tech industries, and the aerospace industry is certainly the pinnacle of high-tech industries,” concludes Ichikowitz.