The United Arab Emirates Navy has ordered two Gowind corvettes from French shipbuilder Naval Group, French president Emmanuel Macron announced during a press conference in Dubai.
Macron’s confirmation comes days after media reports emerged indicating UAE Navy’s interest in the vessels which are turning out to be an export success for the French shipbuilder.
In addition to the two new ships for UAE, Naval Group already has contracts for the construction of ten Gowind corvettes for two navies.
The Egyptian Navy has four Gowind 2500 corvettes on order. The first one was completed in France and delivered to Egypt this September, while the other three will be built in Alexandria, Egypt .
The other Gowind customer is the Royal Malaysian Navy which will have all of its six ships built locally by the Malaysian Boustead Naval Shipyard with technical assistance from DCNS. Malaysia launched its first Gowind ship in August this year .
Egyptian Navy corvettes are 102-meter long ships displacing 2,500 tonnes. Malaysian ships are somewhat larger, displacing a little over 3,000 tons at a length of 111 meters.
It remains to be seen how the UAE Navy corvettes will be configured.