Eleven entities, mostly European, have submitted bids in a tender for new submarines for the Polish Navy, a spokesman for the country’s Armaments Agency has told PAP.

The bids came from Spain, France, Germany and the United Kingdom, as well as from South Korea, Grzegorz Polak said.

In mid-July, Defence Minister Mariusz Blaszczak announced the launch of the ORKA programme.

“This programme, which foresees the procurement of new submarines for the Navy, is one of the most important modernisation programmes of the Polish armed forces,” the minister said.

Polak told PAP that all the bidding producers were world leaders in their field. “They are top companies and producers,” he said, adding that the Armaments Agency would now conduct a thorough evaluation of the offers received.

“It will be necessary to wait a while for a decision,” Polak explained.

Announcing the procedure in late May, Minister Blaszczak said it was for the “purchase of submarines together with a transfer of the necessary technology, which we want to gain through offset orders.”

ORKA is one of the priority programmes of the Technical Modernisation Plan for the years 2013-2022 and also forms part of further plans, for 2017-2016 and 2021-2035.

Initially, ORKA foresees the procurement of between three and four new submarines to an estimated value of PLN 10 billion (EUR 2.25 billion). According to earlier announcements, Poland intends to buy new submarines armed with long-range guided missiles.

The Polish Navy currently has one submarine, which came from the USSR in the 1980s. In addition, since 2002 it has had four small Kobben-type subs from Norway, two of which were retired from service in 2021.