A Bath-based manufacturing company has been subcontracted to make parts for a line of armoured vehicles being made for the British Army.
Horstman will make 250 angular gearboxes and control units that will be used in the army’s eight-wheeled combat vehicle - the Boxer.
The £12m deal was announced by one of the programme’s main production sub-contractors, WFEL, and its German parent company, KMW.
Horstman is owned by a German engineering firm, RENK, which has previously made gearboxes for Boxer vehicles.
All of the gearbox products for the current Boxer MIV programme will be built at Horstman’s premises on Locksbrook Road in Bath, before being supplied for assembly at WFEL’s manufacturing facility in Stockport, Greater Manchester.
The subcontract will create or sustain up to 20 skilled roles across Horstman and its wider UK supply chain, and the company will look to expand its inspection, assembly, test and paint teams in Bath.
Horstman, which employs a number of ex-military personnel, has previously supplied suspension systems for German infantry fighting vehicles the Puma, as well as producing gearboxes for battle tank turrets, tactical 4x4 jeeps and combat engineering vehicles.
In November 2019 ARTEC, a joint venture between KMW and another German company Rheinmetall, signed a £2.3bn contract to deliver more than 500 Boxer vehicles to the British Army.
The Boxer MIV programme aims to source 60% by value of the contract from within the UK, in order to protect engineering and manufacturing skills and make sure the vehicles remain supported through their 30-year operational life.
The vehicles will be manufactured and tested by WFEL and Telford-based RBSL.
More than 800 Boxer vehicles in various configurations have been supplied to or ordered by NATO nations Germany, the Netherlands and Lithuania, as well as Australia.
