Rheinmetall has won a large-volume order for supporting Ukraine with artillery ammunition, the company announced on 4 December 2023.
The Düsseldorf-based company has been tasked with supplying Kyiv with artillery rounds worth around EUR 142 M. The order encompasses tens of thousands of complete 155 mm artillery rounds, including the projectile, fuze, propellant and primer. The customer for the order was unnamed, but was said by Rheinmetall to be “a NATO partner nation whose declared intention is to support Ukraine in its defensive struggle with effective long-term military aid”.
The ammunition, which will be delivered in 2025, will be produced by Rheinmetall Expal Munitions: the group’s newly acquired Spanish subsidiary.
“The current contract highlights Rheinmetall’s role as the world’s largest producer of ammunition, especially in the large calibre domain,” the company noted. “Production and delivery of around 40,000 rounds for Ukraine from an earlier order is already due to take place in 2024.”
As recently as mid-October 2023 the German government placed an order with Rheinmetall for over 100,000 rounds of 155 mm ammunition earmarked for Ukraine – once again from Rheinmetall Expal Munitions – as well as additional DM 121 high-explosive shells. The order is worth a figure in the mid-three-digit million-euro range.
Demand for artillery ammunition is currently very high, due not just to Ukraine’s requirements but also the need to replenish the largely empty ammunition depots of Germany and other NATO and EU countries. Rheinmetall plans a massive increase in ammunition production capacity in 2024 at its plants in Germany, Spain, South Africa and Australia, bringing annual output capacity to around 700,000 artillery rounds.
Rheinmetall currently has multi-year framework contracts for supplying the German Bundeswehr with several hundred rounds of artillery ammunition worth over EUR 1 Bn.
