Within the framing of a European common defence system, the Italian Navy has been playing a leading role in the development of the European Patrol Corvette project, coordinated by Italy, with other EU countries. The new vessel will be constructed by four companies from three different countries, including Italian Fincantieri.
On 6 October, the first operational remote meeting was held between the Italian Navy, representatives from Spain, France Greece and Portugal, the industrial consortium (NAVARIS, FINCANTIERI, NAVAL GROUP, NAVANTIA) and the European Defence Agency (EDA).

"The meeting, from which many useful ideas have emerged, had a very positive outcome and represented the first industrial engagement related to the EPC project. Sharing high level requirements outside governmental ambit is indeed crucial for the development of the project, also in view of the submission deadline set to 9 December 2021 for the Calls for proposals launched by the European Defence Fund, the EU Commission’s financial tool that, along with PESCO projects, aims at developing the European Defence", says Commander Andrea Quondamatteo, in charge of the project for the Italian Navy.
This is the most important project in the maritime sector, within the EU Permanent Structured Cooperation in the area of security and defence policy (Pesco). It was approved by the EU Commission on 12 November 2019. The first country to join Italy was France, subsequently followed by Greece and Spain. Portugal remains as observer, for the moment: it attends the meetings but will join the project at a later time.

A common platform with 2 versions
The European Patrol Corvettes will be affordable, environmentally sustainable, energy-efficient and extremely versatile. They will be able to perform maritime security and law-enforcement operations on the high seas, or will be used for counterterrorism purposes and fight against illegal trafficking, not to mention dual-use missions, such as anti-pollution activities, humanitarian assistance operations and interventions in support of populations in case of natural disasters.

The EPC project is a common platform that can be customised according to member States’ requirements. The overall displacement is expected to be no more than 3,000 tonnes, which will allow the ship to operate from minor harbours. The length of the ship, to be equipped with diesel and/or electrical engines, should not exceed 110 meters.

Of the two versions already designed, the Full Combat Multipurpose seems to meet Italian and Greek requirements, while Spain and France are interested in the Long Range Multipurpose configuration. Italy and Greece need a patrol vessel to be employed across the Wider Mediterranean, with special focus on central and eastern Mediterranean, notably to provide presence and surveillance, equipped with self-defence capabilities, while France and Spain need long-range ships able to operate in overseas territories.

Next steps
On the industrial side, NAVIRIS (joint venture between the Italian FINCANTIERI and French NAVAL GROUP) coordinated the creation of a consortium together with FINCANTIERI, NAVAL GROUP and NAVANTIA, in order to submit common proposals for the 2021 calls of proposals launched by the European Defence Fund (EDF) - whose submission deadline is set to 9 December -  to be selected for funding. Participating member States aim to produce their first corvette prototype as from 2027.

Thanks to the support of the European Defence Agency (EDA), designated as institutional framework for the definition and harmonisation of common requirements, an agreement has been reached to prepare the preliminary documentation describing the project and its characteristics. The Project Arrangement – a binding international document that will enable to establish the roles and conditions of cooperation between the participating countries – is now being defined.

"The next step will be the development of requirements in detail as well as the obtaining of consensus from the participating nations for the following design phase that will mark the start of the procurement process", says Commander Quondamatteo.

Links
https://eda.europa.eu/
https://pesco.europa.eu/
https://eda.europa.eu/what-we-do/EU-defence-initiatives/european-defence-fund-(edf)