Korea Aerospace Industries will plunge into a development program of both civilian and military helicopters.
The aerospace company said on June 25 that it signed an agreement with the Ministry of Industry, Trade, and Energy and the Defense Acquisition Program Administration to develop light civil helicopters and light armed helicopters.
Under the terms of the contract, KAI will develop light civil helicopters under the direction of the industry ministry by 2020 after which the DAPA will take over to develop light armed helicopters based on the civil helicopter design by 2022. In the project to develop the 4.5-ton light civil helicopter, the industry ministry (350 billion won), KAI (200 billion won), Airbus Helicopters (400 billion won) will invest a total of 950 billion won.
In the light armed helicopter development project initiated by the Defense Acquisition Program Administration, a total of 650 billion won will be invested. The military will replace the current helicopter model (500MD) to be obsolete by then with the new LAH model. The program is intended to help the Korean aerospace manufacturer secure core production technology while allowing it to be internationally competitive. The world's helicopter market is forecast to grow to US$635 billion by 2021 from 55,000 helicopters current in use.
Once the development project is completed, KAI aims to sell 1,000 helicopters in Korea and elsewhere, with 23 trillion won of sales revenue and 110,000 jobs from it. Scores of partner firms and research centers will take part in the development project, contributing to the growth of the nation's aerospace industry.
