In an exclusive interview, Leonardo CEO Alessandro Profumo shares with European Defence Matters his views on the current state, challenges and future prospects of the European defence industry. He also comments on the EU’s recent defence initiatives as well as on the Preparatory Action on Defence Research (PADR) in which Leonardo is prominently involved through the OCEAN 2020 project. He stresses the European industry’s readiness to work on a European fighter jet for the future, provided “governments (…) move in this direction”.

The European Commission’s Preparatory Action on Defence Research (PADR), managed and implemented by EDA, reached cruising speed with the first projects signed, the second call for proposals published and close to 50% of the PADR budget already under implementation. Objective: paving the way for a future EU Defence Research Programme.

Nowhere in the military is this statement more appropriate than in the Counter Improvised Explosive Devices (C-IED) domain where European cooperation spearheaded by the European Defence Agency's Project Team C-IED has produced remarkable results over the past 10 years.

The company name Utilis is probably not familiar to many of our readers but the young Croatian SME specialising in cybersecurity wrote history, so to speak, as the leader of the consortium running the first fully fledged defence research project co-funded by the EU under the European Structural and Investment Funds (ESIF).

HOT BLADE 2018, already the 12th helicopter exercise organised under the umbrella of EDA's Helicopter Exercise Programme (HEP), took place last May at Beja Air Force Base, in Southern Portugal. It involved 21 helicopters, six fighters and two transporters as well as crews/observers from Portugal, Belgium, Netherlands, Germany, Hungary, Slovenia, Austria, Czech Republic and Italy.