The French defence procurement agency (DGA) has awarded a contract to Thales to supply 50 electronic warfare programming stations for the French military’s helicopter fleet.

Under the contract, Thales will supply 24 warfare stations to the French Navy, with the rest being delivered to French Army aviation.

The programming stations will be used by navy and army helicopter fleets, including Panther, Cougar, EC725 HUS, Tiger standard 1 and 2, NH90, Gazelle and Puma.

A warfare station uploads threat information to the threat libraries allowing the protection system to detect potential threats in the battlespace and act accordingly.

The station also collects and analyses recorded post-mission data to supplement threat libraries for future operations.

Other advantages of the warfare station include easy operation and training, common maintenance procedures and more efficient sharing of operational libraries.

Deliveries of the electronic warfare programming stations are scheduled for the end of the first quarter of 2012.