No surprise as Sweden signs up for multinational 6x6 initiative

14th December 2021 - 15:45 GMT | by The Shephard News Team

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Patria 6x6 APC. (Photo: Patria)

As expected, Sweden joins Estonia, Finland and Latvia in the Common Armoured Vehicle System programme.

Sweden on 14 December officially announced that it will join the Finnish-led multinational 6x6 Common Armoured Vehicle System (CAVS) programme, confirming an earlier report by Shephard.

‘This milestone is significant for the whole programme. Extensive cooperation and network between countries will improve the mobility, cost-effectiveness, cooperation capabilities and maintenance capacity of the participating countries,’ said Jussi Järvinen, president of the Land Business Unit at Patria.

He added that ‘the result of this programme is a very cost-effective solution for participating countries’.

An official at the Swedish Defence Materiel Administration previously told Shephard that 6x6 vehicles procured under CAVS could ‘supplement our current fleet of Patria vehicles’, as the Swedish Army looks to double its number of brigades to four by 2030.

Finland and Latvia are the other CAVS participants: the former signed an LoI in December 2019 to order 160 APCs for delivery by 2023 while the latter received its first batch of vehicles in October 2021 under an order for 200 placed in August that year.

Estonia signed an LoI in 2019 and remains involved in the technical arrangement that forms the basis of CAVS, although the Baltic republic has not yet signed a framework contract to order vehicles.