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Swedish manufacturer also pitching GlobalEye to Canada,

CEO says

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Will pursue NATO contract after plans to buy rival Boeing

E-7

canceled

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Saab giving Canada information on Gripen fighter jets

By Allison Lampert

MONTREAL, Nov 20 (Reuters) - Sweden's Saab AB

has made offers of its GlobalEye surveillance planes to Qatar

and Saudi Arabia as part of a broader effort to drive demand for

its military aircraft, the defence group's CEO said on Thursday.

"We are campaigning, and we have given them offers," Saab

CEO Micael Johansson told Reuters in an interview.

Qatar and Saudi Arabia have both shown interest in the

early-warning and control aircraft already ordered by the United

Arab Emirates, he said. "We are looking forward to how the

decision process will look like in these countries."

Saab, which won orders from France earlier this year for the

aircraft, has also pitched the platform based on a Bombardier

business jet to Canada, he said.

"There are a number of countries now looking at this

capability and evaluating it," he said of GlobalEye. "We are in

different stages in different campaigns as we speak. Some

campaigns we have provided offers."

The Netherlands defense ministry last week announced that it

along with several NATO allies had abandoned plans to buy six of

the rival Boeing E-7 Wedgetail planes and was assessing

other aircraft types.

"So now they are looking at whether they can maybe have

another capability which we are of course proposing to them, the

Global Eye," Johansson said.

He was in Canada this week on the sidelines of a state visit

to Ottawa by King Carl XVI Gustaf and Queen Silvia of Sweden.

Johansson said Saab would be prepared to transfer technology

and knowledge as part of setting up a facility with Canada's

Bombardier to install sensors and other tasks normally done in

Sweden to modify the empty "green" jets for defense

applications. Canada has not yet made a decision, he said.

Separately, Johansson said Saab was not actively campaigning

to sell its Gripen fighter jet to Canada, but was rather giving

Ottawa "information" to decide whether to buy the plane.

Canada has considered the Gripen to replace some Lockheed

Martin F-35 jets following a trade dispute with the

United States.

Saab had offered to build the Gripen jets in Canada under

license with Bombardier, creating a third production line to

join those already operating in Sweden and Brazil.

Johansson said the Swedish and Brazilian production lines

would both produce Gripen jets for Colombia as part of a recent

$3.6 billion deal with the South American country.