SHAH ALAM: On September 24, the Procurement Division of the Defence Ministry published a tender for the supply and delivery of one hundred High Mobility Reconnaisance Vehicle (HRMV) for the Army. The HRMV is the official name for the combat buggies being sought to complement the scramblers in reconnaissance platoons of the infantry units.

The HRMV are part of the 733 support vehicles sought by the Army and paid for by the 2024 budget. Anyhow 14 bidder had qualified for the tender with the highest bid pegged at RM134 million plus change. The highest bid is an outlier from the 13 other bids with the lowest bid at RM71.8 million. Two bids came in at RM76 million (same bidder with two companies) while six bids came exactly at RM72 million which suggests that it came from one bidder with six companies.

The other bids came in at RM73 and RM74 million plus change. It must be noted that the apart from RM134 million bid the rest came under the budget for the combat utes. As I posted previously, the Polaris Polaris MRZR light tactical all-terrain vehicle is the favourite. Whether or not it was put forward as a bid and under the budget is beyond me. The others likely put forward for the bid is the China-made
China Desert Cross 1000.3 combat ute and the Chaiseri light tactical vehicle (LTV).

Unlike the MRZR with two or four seats variants, the Desert Cross can carry three soldiers and a load bed. The Chaiseri one has four seats and a small load bed in the rear. That said only the MRZR and the Desert Cross have been used in combat.

The tender for the supply and delivery of a single CBRN command vehicle is no less fierce than the HRMV. Eight bidders qualified for the tender with the lowest bid coming in at RM9.7 million and the highest RM10.5 million.

As for the tender to supply 45 gun towers for the Close Support Artillery Batallions, nine bidders have qualified with two bids coming exactly at RM28.350 million which was also the lowest bid. The highest is RM31.185 million.

The latest gun tower operated by the RAD is the 36 Iveco Daily procured in 2021. Based on the bid prices for the tender which the Iveco Dailys was selected, I am inclined to believe that the latest one involved only local assembled vehicles. Th other gun towers in service are the Vamtac operated by 1 RAD while the rest are Global Komited GK MK-1s and small batch Land Rover Defenders.

With the GK-M2 recently selected as the FFR vehicle for the Army, one might assume that the Global Komited vehicle will be favourite for this tender. Your guess is as good as mine!

— Malaysian Defence

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