Procurement documents published by the United Kingdom Ministry of Defense have revealed the costs of support and service for the Archer self-propelled artillery systems. This insight shows for those unique features and capabilities, enabled by its highly-automated subsystems allowing, for example, to shoot 21 rounds in under 150 seconds, you need to pay accordingly.
As reported by UK Defense Journal, the British defense department has announced the upcoming signing of a contract for long-term support of the Archer self-propelled guns for a total value of 58 million pounds sterling (about 72.7 million US dollars) spanning seven years.
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The manufacturer, BAE System Bofors AB was chosen as the contractor without any alternative, as this is the only company that can provide these services. The plan is to finalize the agreement in Q2 of 2026, meaning the deadline will be around late 2033.
The commissioned services include maintenance and repair of the self-propelled guns, provision of components, specialized training of the military personnel, as well as executing any technical adjustments and modernization of the artillery units as needed.
On a note from Defense Express, the UK has a total of 14 Archer SPGs in operation, purchased from Sweden to replace the AS-90s that were handed over to Ukraine. A rough calculation suggests that approximately £591,800 must be spent annually on one Archer, or about $741,500.
But we should keep in mind that the maintenance costs for military equipment per unit actually depends very much on the overall number of systems involved. To illustrate: say, if the British Army had not 14 but 140 Archers and ordered maintenance for all of them at once, the wholesale price tag for the package would drop, hence reducing the "per unit" cost of services.
On an unrelated note, the decision to procure the Archers was a provisional measure by UK officials to address the security gap left by handing over its AS-90 guns, while the broader artillery update and expansion rely on acquiring RCH 155 systems.
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