Babcock’s Arrowhead 140 design to form the basis of the future flagships of the Polish Navy

Babcock’s Arrowhead 140 design has been selected for the Polish Navy’s Miecznik (Swordfish) future frigate programme by the Polish Ministry of National Defence, the UK shipbuilder announced on 4 March.

The Miecznik programme, which is valued at around PLN8 billion (USD1.8 billion), covers the design and build of three new multi-mission frigates for the Polish Navy at local shipyards through a transfer of technology agreement. A consortium led by Polska Grupa Zbrojeniowa (Polish Armaments Group, PGZ), and including Gdynia-based shipbuilders PGZ Naval Shipyard and Remontowa Shipbuilding, will be responsible for the delivery of the frigates.

The PGZ-Miecznik consortium has also signed additional strategic partnership agreements with Thales UK, which will supply a modified variant of its TACTICOS combat management system (CMS), and MBDA UK, which Janes understands will supply its Sea Ceptor shipborne local area air-defence system. The Thales CMS has been already mounted on the Polish offshore patrol vessel (OPV) ORP Slazak .