Australia will ink a contract to supply more than 100 infantry fighting vehicles to Germany.The vehicles will be assembled at Ipswich, Queensland, with parts mostly imported from Germany.
A contract worth more than $1 billion is expected to be signed by both nations later on Thursday, in a move which is likely to sustain hundreds of jobs at Rheinmetall's MILVEHCOE facility in Ipswich., but its future was put in doubt after Australia awarded a more lucrative contract for Infantry Fighting Vehicles to a South Korean company instead of Germany's Rheinmetall.
Despite Germany's disappointment at missing out on the IFV project, the ABC has confirmed politicians in Berlin have overnight voted in favour of keeping the Australian export deal. Labor has previously described the project as Australia's "single largest ever defence export deal" but some figures inside industry have contested the claim.