SOFIA (Bulgaria), March 13 (SeeNews) – Bulgaria will start assessing the offers it has received for the supply of a new type of combat aircraft on March 14, the defence ministry said on Monday.
The defence ministry sent a request for proposal for the procurement of a new type of combat aircraft to Italy, Portugal and the United States, and Sweden in December 2016 to replace the Bulgarian Air Force's ageing fleet of Russian-made MiG fighter jets.
The offers were opened on Monday in the presence of representatives of the four countries, the defence ministry said in a statement.
Portugal's offer comes with a logistics package sourced from the USA.
All of the invited countries met the March 13 deadline to submit their proposals, the ministry said.
In March 2016, Bulgaria's government approved a 2.4 billion lev ($1.4 billion/1.2 billion euro) plan to upgrade the country's defence equipment by acquiring a new type of combat aircraft and multi-purpose patrol ships and by extending the operational life of at least 10 MiG-29 jet fighters.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)