France's Dassault open to cooperation after fighter programme collapse

By Florence Loeve and Tim Hepher

PARIS, July 1 (Reuters) - French planemaker Dassault Aviation is open to cooperation after the collapse of a Franco-German-Spanish fighter programme, its CEO said on Wednesday, while leaving open the prospect of working with a non-European partner.

Eric Trappier was speaking in his first formal testimony since Germany and France last month scrapped a project to build a new-generation fighter following industrial disputes between Dassault and its main partner Airbus.

"We are capable of cooperating, we have shown it in the past, but we want to cooperate with rules that are accepted from the start," he told a French Senate committee.

Trappier said the collapse of the core fighter part of the FCAS project followed irreconcilable differences with Airbus, which has in turn blamed Dassault for the breakdown.

Asked if France could press ahead with its own fighter, as it did with the Rafale after quitting the Eurofighter in the 1980s, Trappier said, "We can do it alone, that's possible, or we can find partners. Do these partners exclusively have to be European? That's an open question."

There has been speculation that France could turn to Swedish planemaker Saab as a potential partner or team up with a Middle East importing nation for the next generation of fighters due to budget constraints. Airbus is also courting Saab.

Saab was not immediately available for comment.

Trappier later mentioned Dassault's existing partnership with the UAE, saying that it was interested in finding out whether France would launch a future combat aircraft programme.

PLAN B

"I am not saying we necessarily have the financial means to do it alone", Trappier said of a next-generation fighter jet, although "from a technical and technological standpoint, we can do it ourselves, together with our (French) partners".

Trappier noted the potential snowball effect of larger plane designs as a result of compromises with international partners, leading to higher costs and fewer exports.

France's need for a smaller and more agile plane capable of being deployed from carriers was blamed in part for its exit from Eurofighter and most recently, the breakdown of FCAS.

Asked about a possible "plan B" to FCAS, he replied "that's a Super Rafale, which doesn't mean we won't develop a future combat aircraft".

He added this would still cost less "than developing that massive combat aircraft that is supposedly going to fly in 2035" in an apparent reference to the now-abandoned FCAS fighter.

While Germany and France have pledged to keep alive part of the FCAS programme by continuing to develop data links between warplanes and drones or other assets, known as the "combat cloud," Trappier aimed a dig at the concept.

"A cloud is just water vapour," he said, adding that the real requirement was a comprehensive command-and-control system.

Trappier also confirmed that Dassault's divorce with Airbus, which mainly represents Germany and Spain in military aviation, had extended to a separate European drone programme.

He accused Airbus of trying to kick Dassault out of the Eurodrone project and said discussions over the dispute were under way. Reuters reported last month that Dassault was seeking compensation from Airbus over a change in industrial workshare.

(Reporting by Florence Loeve and Tim Hepher; Editing by Elaine Hardcastle and Alexander Smith)