Overview
- Ministers have not decided whether to complete the planned buy of 88 F-35s or cap deliveries at 16 and pivot to Saab’s Gripen E, including the option of a mixed fleet.
- A leaked Canadian evaluation from 2021 reportedly scored the F-35 at about 95 percent versus 33 percent for the Gripen across mission performance, upgradability, sustainment, technical criteria, and capability delivery.
- Industry Minister Mélanie Joly has criticized the industrial benefits tied to the F-35 and is considering Saab’s conditional jobs offer linked to local Gripen production and sustainment.
- Critics call Saab’s 9,000–10,000 jobs estimate unrealistic, pointing to Brazil’s Gripen line employing only a few hundred workers and noting that Canada’s industry ministry says it has not been given the modeling behind the figure.
- Saab’s CEO says Canada could receive Gripen E jets about three years after an order with domestic assembly in roughly three to five years depending on the setup, a timeline presented as part of the company’s pitch.