Trend Radar
The defense industry should keep a close eye on these technological developments
What awaits the defense industry in 2024 and beyond? Which technological trends and developments should you keep a close eye on? We asked our experts at VINCORION.
Henning Radtke, Head of Governmental Affairs at VINCORION:
“The interoperability of systems and platforms for military operations is of essential importance and, in my view, will be a hot topic in the coming years. We are observing a rapidly progressing consolidation and harmonization across NATO’s armed forces. This has several advantages: armed forces from different countries are familiar with their partners’ systems and can use them and, if necessary, share maintenance and repair capacities. This creates economies of scale in joint procurement and deployment as well as greater and more reliable capacity utilization in the industry.”
Daniel Zeitler, Head of Product Management at VINCORION:
“NATO plans to be climate neutral by 2050 and the EU and national armies also have clearly defined net-zero carbon emissions targets for the next 20 years. But we know, that military systems have life cycles of more than 20 years, so armed forces need a future-proof energysupply already today. To achieve this, we must exploit all the technological possibilities offered by hybridization and electrification and, in addition to reducing emissions, integrate the resulting tactical, user-friendliness, and cost-efficiency benefits.
Our PGM low emissionsV gensets are a perfect example of this – thanks to their hybrid technology, fewer refueling operations are required, for example, which has direct tactical advantages in terms of personnel requirements, logistics, and costs. More climate-friendly, tactically superior, and more economical – in my view, green defense is a groundbreaking trend.”
Patrick Möser, Product Manager Digital & Service at VINCORION:
“Since 2022, we have seen a strong increase in demand for an effective spare parts supply and more efficient MRO processes in the military sector. In order to meet these needs, we are focusing on creating new, innovative services. Thereby we are using the power of digitalization for upcoming challenges, to already virtually model and evaluate the usage of complex weapons systems at an early stage. With this, we support our customers in closing capability gaps and opening up new potential. Market-driven availability, operational readiness, and lean life-cycle costs are at the heart of this approach. Our end customers, e.g., for our new hybrid gensets, value this approach.”
Rolf Kummer, Director Strategic Projects at VINCORION:
“With military operations becoming increasingly complex and unpredictable, modularity in military vehicles is becoming more and more relevant, which is why I believe it will be a key trend in the coming years. A modular design increases the operational readiness of land systems by ensuring that individual modules are always available for replacement, e.g. through spares pooling, thereby significantly reducing delivery times. This not only decreases the downtime of weapon systems, but also saves costs. This is why the aerospace industry has successfully been using modular design and logistics concepts such as these for some time.”
The defense industry should keep a close eye on these technological developments
