Archive: News & Articles

At the International Armoured Vehicles Conference in London, the newly formed Rheinmetall Protection Systems GmbH (RPS) presented an optimized combination solution for protection against various threats on today’s battlefield. RPS brings together the competencies and capabilities across the entire spectrum of passive and active protection that have been developed in various Group companies. RPS operates […]

On January 7 the new Conservative-Green government coalition in Austria swore in Klaudia Tanner as Austria’s first woman Defence Minister. She previously headed the Lower Austrian Farmers’ Union when she was asked by the young Chancellor Sebastian Kurz (OEVP) to take over the long neglected and chronically underfunded Ministry of Defence. The former interim defence […]

ESD spoke with Jonas Geust, President of SYSTEMS at Patria, about the companies future plans and projects. The questions were asked by Stephen Elliott.   ESD: Please would tell our readers a little more about Patria’s business and role as a systems integrator – and the start and continued growth of this corporate sector? Geust: […]

Today DWT‘s symposium “Perspectives on Defence Technology 2020” began in Bonn, Germany. During the opening speech, the Vice President of the German procurement agency BAAINBw, Major General Gert Friedrich Nultsch, emphasized that a rethinking process had taken place in Germany, in which products are only procured on demand now. “No project without procedure,” said Nultsch. […]

During his visit to Sevastopol Russian President Vladimir Putin met with naval industry executives and visited a special exhibition showcasing new naval development prospects that are in line with his vision for Russia’s overdue modernisation. President Putin saw a number of future ship models and naval weapons concepts, including the Lamantin – Russia’s new aircraft […]

From a Central European perspective, a continent with so many reasons to flee, especially to Europe, would have other needs than the procurement of fighter jets. Many observers see fighter jets more as part of the problem that is driving Africans out of Africa. In discussions, one often hears the simplistic argument that arms sales […]

Aero Vodochody Aerospace will almost double their revenues up to CZK5-6 billion (€200-240 million) this year in comparison to 2019, the company announced this morning. The growth will be strongly driven by new MRO businesses, especially ramp up on the A220 programme and start of industrialization of L-39NG new jet trainer and light attack aircraft. […]

Leonardo has received a $176.5 million contract for the production of the first batch of 32 TH-73A helicopters in support of the Advanced Helicopter Training System (AHTS) programme. Under the Advanced Helicopter Training System (AHTS) programme, the U.S. Navy has selected Leonardo’s TH-119 single-engine IFR helicopter to replace the ageing and increasingly difficult to maintain […]

Juniper Systems Limited just released the Mesa 3 Rugged Tablet. Its new quad-core Intel Pentium processor offers the speed and flexibility that field engineers and specialists need to run processor-intensive applications. It also delivers a huge increase in system memory (RAM), doubling to 8 GB from the Mesa 2. This provides greater capacity, speed, and […]

Yesterday Boeing submitted its response to the call for tenders for Germany’s future heavy transport helicopter (STH). The invitation to tender was published by the German procurement agency BAAINBw in June 2019. The contract for the procurement of 44 to 60 helicopters, including maintenance, repair and training, is expected to be awarded in 2021. Boeing […]

The news spread like wildfire late Monday night: The order for the Multipurpose Combat Ship (MKS) 180 goes to the Damen Group (based in Gorinchem, Netherlands). The remaining German competitor in the international bidding process, German Naval Yards Kiel, which had entered with thyssenkrupp Marine Systems as subcontractor, is left behind. The information is based […]

Seven months after assuming initial operational capability (IOC), the U.S. Navy’s Second Fleet was declared fully operational capability (FOC) December 31, 2019. With a focus on better serving and supporting operations in the North Atlantic and Arctic, it was reactivated in May last year as a “leaner, agile and more expeditionary” fleet after its decommissioning […]

The German Bundeswehr ordered a thousand logistic vehicles from Rheinmetall worth €382 million. This is the third call-off from a framework contract signed on July 5, 2017, which runs for a period of seven years and encompasses a total of 2,271 vehicles from Rheinmetall’s HX family as part of the Bundeswehr’s “Unprotected Transport Vehicles” project. […]

Israel plans to build their own communication satellites. Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) was awarded a contract to develop and build “Dror 1”. Dror 1 is intended to meet the satellite communication needs of Israel for the next 15 years. Planned capabilities are an advanced digital communication payload and “smartphone in space” capabilities, to provide communication […]

Indra and the Galician company Gaerum have been working together on Targus, one of the largest civil drones in Europe, for several years. This work has now been rewarded by the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), that approved Targus to start flight tests. It is the first time that a 1.25-ton aircraft prepared to fly […]

Yesterday the Cabinet of the Netherlands’ Government has submitted a so-called D-letter to the Parliament, to begin the construction of the Combat Support Ship ZR.MS. DEN HELDER. With this new ship, the supply capacity of the Royal Netherlands Navy (RNLN) will once again expand to two ships. The construction of this new vessel for the […]

The Royal Netherlands Army will modernize their armored recovery vehicles (ARVs). Starting immediately, Rheinmetall will completely overhaul another 21 Bergepanzer 3 Büffel ARVs of the Royal Netherlands Army, bringing them up to the latest technological and tactical standard. This will extend the service life of these tried-and-tested combat support vehicles – developed by Rheinmetall on […]

Randall Howard is Director of Business Development for the integrated F-16/F-21 Fighter Group at Lockheed-Martin. He is the company’s primary interface and senior advisor for developing and maintaining key customer relationships, strategies, proposal development and transition plans to support and generate new business for the F-16 line, including the F-21, as it is called for […]

Today Elbit Systems announced that NANOVA, the company’s nanosatellite, was successfully launched to space. NANOVA is a 3U (the size of a juice carton), 5 kg CubeSat that hosts an Ultra High Frequency (UHF) communication payload providing a direct satellite link for data, voice and text messaging. It was launched from the Satish Dhawan Space […]

RT LTA Systems inaugurates its new headquarters in Yavne, Israel. Three times larger than RT’s previous offices, the new building houses all of the company’s activities under one roof. As part of the overall upgrade, a special effort was put in rebuilding the aerostat’s assembly line using advanced equipment and allows the company to offer […]

According to Rosoboronexport it carried out a contract worth over 100 million rubles ($1.5 million) to supply a foreign customer with a batch of ORSIS T-5000 rifles. “Since 2017, when Rosoboronexport was granted the right to supply civilian and service weapons abroad, the company has considered requests from foreign customers worth over $150 million. Several […]