<p>HELSINKI — Finland says it has received final offers from all five manufacturers bidding in a contest to provide new fighter jets to the Nordic country’s military in a 10 billion-euro ($12 billion) deal to replace its aging fleet of F-18 Hornet aircraft.</p>
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<a href="https://twitter.com/DefenceFinland/status/1387712649325068292">The Finnish Defense Forces said Thursday</a> that it would carefully evaluate quotations received from the governments of Britain, France, Sweden and the United States by fall this year.</p>
<p>After that the Finnish government led by Prime Minister Sanna Marin would pick the winner by the end of 2021, most likely in December.</p>
<p>The fighter jet models in contention for the deal are the Boeing F-18 Super Hornet and Lockheed Martin F-35A from the United States, Dassault Rafale from France, Eurofighter Typhoon from Britain and the Saab Gripen from Sweden.</p>
<p>Boeing said in a separate statement that its offer includes the option of Finland acquiring a combination of the F-18 Super Hornets and its electronic warfare variant, the EA-18G Growler. </p>
<p>European Union member Finland is a militarily non-aligned nation but closely cooperates with NATO — a situation similar to neighboring Sweden. The Finnish Air Force has a fleet of more than 60 F-18s and started a process in 2014 to look for a successor to the fighters which were acquired in the early 1990s. </p>
<p>The military didn’t disclose Thursday any details of the final bids which had a deadline of Friday, or how many planes each manufacturer would offer but the number is generally expected to hover between 60-64.</p>
<p>It said the winner would be picked on four considerations: the multi-role fighter’s military capability, security of supply, proposed industrial cooperation with Finland and costs. </p>
<p>“Security and defense policy implications will be assessed separately outside of the actual tendering process,” the Finnish Defense Forces said in a statement.</p>
