Terrex

The Terrex is an 8×8 armoured fighting vehicle developed by ST Kinetics (now ST Engineering Land Systems) of Singapore in partnership with Timoney Technology of Ireland. The programme began as a government-funded effort to produce a new generation of armoured personnel carriers for the Singapore Armed Forces, with ST Kinetics selected as design authority and manufacturer. The AV-81 prototype was shown publicly for the first time at DSEi 2001, using conventional coil-spring suspension; later variants adopted hydro-pneumatic struts with real-time damping control, and an electric-hybrid drive was also developed. By mid-2004 one prototype and one pre-production vehicle had been built and trialled in Asia and Europe.

A 2002 agreement with the Turkish firm Otokar led to the Yavuz prototype of 2005, which used a flat underbody in place of the V-shaped hull and revised rear suspension. Yavuz received no production orders, but the SAF funded further development of the design as the Terrex AV-82. In 2009 Singapore announced the acquisition of at least 135 Terrex ICVs to replace its V-200 vehicles; the 2nd Battalion, Singapore Infantry Regiment was the first unit equipped, converting to a motorised infantry battalion with training beginning in February 2010.

The layout is conventional, with the driver front left and the powerpack to the right, leaving a troop compartment served by a power-operated ramp and roof hatches. Construction is modular, with armour packages ranging from all-round protection against 7.62 mm NATO ball and shell splinters, with a frontal arc defeating 12.7 mm armour-piercing rounds, up to ceramic-composite packages giving all-round protection against 14.5 mm armour-piercing projectiles. A double hull with an external V-shape is designed to withstand a 12 kg TNT mine blast with the vehicle remaining mobile. NBC protection and a battlefield management system are fitted. Suspension is by patented independent double wishbones, with powered steering on the front four wheels, central tyre inflation and ABS as standard. The baseline AV-81 is amphibious, propelled by two water jets at the rear of the hull. The vehicle is air-portable by C-130.

Armament options include remote weapon stations with a 40 mm automatic grenade launcher and 7.62 mm coaxial machine gun, stabilised turrets with the 25 mm M242 Bushmaster, pintle-mounted machine guns over the troop compartment, and, with reduced dismount capacity, turrets mounting 105 mm guns or rocket launchers. Service variants include command, .50 calibre HMG, Spike ATGM, pioneer, medical, RSTA and STORM configurations.

SAIC offered the Terrex for the US Marine Personnel Carrier programme from 2012, later restructured as the Amphibious Combat Vehicle programme. Water and human-factors trials were conducted at Camp Pendleton in July 2013, with ballistic and blast testing at the Nevada Automotive Test Center. The Terrex 2 was unveiled at DSEI 2015 and selected in November 2015 alongside the BAE Systems/Iveco SuperAV for the ACV 1.1 EMD phase; BAE Systems won the competition in June 2018. The Sentinel 2, developed with Elbit Systems of Australia for LAND 400 Phase 2, lost to the Rheinmetall Boxer CRV in 2018; 19 were subsequently delivered to the Ghana Army in 2020, comprising 8×8 vehicles with Elbit UT30 turrets and 6×6 reconnaissance vehicles.

The Terrex s5 was unveiled at the 2024 Singapore Airshow, offering STANAG Level 4 protection, hybrid-electric drive with a silent running mode, waypoint driving and UGV/UAV teaming, in Trooper, command, ATGM, fire support, mortar and amphibious variants. MINDEF contracted for it in December 2025 as the TITAN IFV, with deliveries from 2028. Kazakhstan Paramount Engineering will produce a Terrex 2 derivative, the Barys-A, under licence.

In November 2016 nine SAF Terrex vehicles returning from an exercise in Taiwan were seized in Hong Kong, straining Singapore–China relations; they were released and returned to Singapore on 30 January 2017.