UK orders more Boxer armoured vehicles

The UK has ordered 100 more Boxer MIVs. (Rheinmetall)

The United Kingdom has ordered 100 more Boxer Mechanised Infantry Vehicles (MIVs) for the British Army. The UK government, represented by Europe‘s Organisation for Joint Armament Cooperation (OCCAR), and Rheinmetall-Krauss-Maffei Wegmann (KMW) consortium Artec signed an extension to the original GBP2.8 billion (nearly USD3.7 billion) contract between OCCAR and Artec in November 2019 for 523 Boxers. KMW subsidiary WFEL, which is manufacturing the vehicles at its new facility in Stockport, said that the contract extension was worth several hundred million pounds. The 100 additional vehicles will be infantry carriers, command-and-control (C2) vehicles, and ambulances, which will be used for the British Army‘s new armoured brigade combat teams (BCTs), as planned by the British Army‘s 2021 Defence Command Paper.

Rheinmetall and KMW reported that Boxer series production is under way in Germany, after which most of the vehicles already ordered would be produced in the UK by Rheinmetall BAE Systems Land (RBSL) and WFEL. According to WFEL, the additional vehicles will be manufactured in both the UK and Germany for delivery from 2024, while deliveries of the original 523 Boxers are scheduled to begin in 2023.

Referring to the Russian threat, OCCAR said that increasing capability across all Boxer countries was “critical”.