Rheinmetall Defence Australia has released a video on YouTube on October 11, 2020, showing the Block 1 Boxer CRV (Combat Reconnaissance Vehicle) for the Australian Army conducting factory trial tests. Rheinmetall is currently delivering 211 Boxer vehicles to the Australian Army under Land 400 Phase 2. The Boxer’s key purpose is to find the enemy; to identify them and choose how and when to engage. Rheinmetall Defence Australia is currently delivering 211 Boxer vehicles to the Australian Army under Land 400 Phase 2. The Boxer’s key purpose is to find the enemy; to identify them and choose how and when to engage.
Rheinmetall has opened its Military Vehicle Centre of Excellence (MILVEHCOE) in Redbank, Queensland. The MILVEHCOE is an 11ha precinct incorporating a regional headquarters for Rheinmetall and a major manufacturing hub that will deliver vehicles into the ADF, including Boxer 8×8 Combat Reconnaissance Vehicles (CRV) under Australia’s billion project Land 400 Phase 2 and high mobility logistics trucks under the Land 121 Phase 3B/5B program. The MILVEHCOE heralded a ‘new era in Australian manufacturing’ as the company transferred technology and systems from Germany to establish a global hub for the continuous design, manufacture, export and support for military vehicles, platforms and turrets.
The first of 25 Boxers – 13 multipurpose and 12 turreted reconnaissance variants – that are being manufactured in Germany through to 2021 to meet an early Australian capability requirement for familiarisation and training, was formally handed over to the army in September 2019. Before delivery the Boxers are being modified locally with Australian-specific communications and battlefield management systems. Production of the balance of 186 platforms – a mix of reconnaissance, command-and-control, joint fires, surveillance, ambulance, and battlefield repair and recovery variants – will begin in late 2022 at RDA’s AUD170 million Military Vehicle Centre of Excellence (MILVEHCOE).
The Boxer is a multirole armoured fighting vehicle designed by an international consortium to accomplish a number of operations through the use of installable mission modules. The nations participating in the Boxer program have changed as the program has developed. The Boxer vehicle is produced by the ARTEC GmbH (armoured vehicle technology) industrial group, and the programme is being managed by OCCAR (Organisation for Joint Armament Cooperation). ARTEC GmbH is based in Munich; its parent companies are Krauss-Maffei Wegmann GmbH and Rheinmetall Military Vehicles GmbH on the German side, and Rheinmetall Defence Nederland B.V. for the Netherlands. Overall, Rheinmetall has a 64% stake in the joint venture.
