OPINION. “Effective and sovereign European defense: now is the time to be industrially inventive”

By Franck Vigilant, CEO of Mews Partners, specialist in defense issues and General Jean-Marc Vigilant, general officer of the Air and Space Force, researcher associated with IRIS and president of EuroDefense – France.

Since the arrival of Donald Trump to power and Europe’s awareness of the new geopolitical balances, the old continent has pulled itself together in its own defense. Massive investments are announced by NATO, by the European Defense Agency, by the European Commission, by every government in Europe… taxpayers and industrialists could believe in a relaxation of budgetary constraints. However, the current economic context, with public debt exceeding 110% of GDP in France and 90% on average in the euro zone, imposes precisely the opposite: maximizing the value of each euro invested and seizing the opportunity to fundamentally transform. Here are some ideas for industry to consider to strengthen European Defense.

Manufacturers have the opportunity to deploy product line strategies by relying on sustainable technical bases and by planning limited expenditure, focused on reduced scope of development. This approach generates significant economies of scale throughout the Defense Industrial and Technological Base (DITB) chain. It also allows better segmentation of the offer to respond to the inevitable variability of operational needs.

Then, the increase in production volumes will make it possible to take full advantage ofamélioration continue and Lean by playing on repeatability. The challenge is also to review product design and look for breakthroughs to anchor in standards to optimize costs, and apply the principles of “Design for Manufacturing”.

These initiatives will allow manufacturers to make realistic promises to public contractors in terms of value/cost ratio and to keep them.

If industrial performance concerns all players in the sector, the subject deserves to be broadened across the continent and the entire ecosystem that could contribute to it, including certain newcomers.

First of all, the startups et Tech players innovative Europeans, particularly in theIAcan disrupt existing practices. Traditional manufacturers must adapt their product architectures to easily accommodate these innovations and evolve towards agile approaches allowing continuous integration according to the principle of: “Code in the morning, fly in the afternoon!” HAS”

Others historic industrial sectors like theautomobilewith extensive experience in productivity and mass production, can also contribute to the ramp-up, by mobilizing their tools and their industrial know-how. The example of Renault engaging in the production of drones illustrates this well.

It then becomes crucial to managing industrial capacities across the continent to prevent siled initiatives from limiting the effects of scale and thus multiplying expenses.

Furthermore, the value created must be shared equitably and generate economic benefits proportional to the investments made, a necessary condition for the social acceptability of war efforts, which is currently very limited in Europe. This is the principle of Geo Return applied in space and which promotes collaborations between manufacturers from different nations.

Strengthening European Defense requires rapid transformation: revising industrial methods and collaboration rules, rethinking industrial plans and products, seeking efficiency at all levels, training engineers in new practices, and evolving regulatory frameworks and models financing. This is the price of the political acceptability of this change of direction.