Strategic independence is the result of a will to possess the ability to pursue a defence and security policy freely and autonomously. This principle is manifest in the sovereign control of extensive military capabilities whose assurance over the long-term requires that the Defence Technological and Industrial Base (DTIB) that produces, maintains and improves them be considered as a defence capability in its own right.

The choices made in France have created a defence industrial policy, which is guaranteed by the Directorate-general of armament (Direction générale de l’armement—DGA), which is also a key player.

In contrast to the civil market, the defence market is very closed for several reasons. Above all, development and production function according to a regime of authorisation that de facto puts limits on the players. Exports are controlled: in principle they are prohibited other than by explicit state-approved exception. Retaining control of the national asset that defence industry represents is also the subject of great attention to foreign investment in France, strengthened further by the recent PACTE law.⁽¹⁾

Clients tend to be states and few in number. The arms market is one of small volumes, long development cycles⁽²⁾ and even longer equipment life. The products are more and more complex, high-tech and with specific requirements for performance, reliability and sourcing. These limitations imply close scrutiny of the DTIB in order to respond to the needs of our forces in development and production and also for maintenance in operational condition.

The French DITB is a top-notch technological ecosystem, able to produce almost all of our defence needs, that covers the whole of the chain of added value. It has major project leaders, many qualified as system managers and integrators, and a network of sub-contractors on several levels, such as successful ETI, SME and start-ups,⁽³⁾ that bring innovation and in some cases represent over 80 per cent of value added and contribute to the competitiveness of our major industrial groups.

The DITB is not limited to the industrial sector however: it obviously includes public and private research laboratories and public bodies, such as ONÉRA and CNES⁽⁴⁾ for the aerospace sector, which bring their skills and experience as much to the lowest TRL⁽⁵⁾ as to the most complex systems.

Technological advance is a measure of operational superiority, and demands research at a low TRL, in particular in areas unique to military applications (‘non dual’) such as supersonic aeronautical propulsion and the missile sector, which require significant financial investment. These studies do eventually have some fallout in the civil sector, and inversely technological advance is acquired through innovation in matters that are of interest to both civil and military markets.⁽⁶⁾

Through the DGA, the Ministry for the armed forces ensures development and maintenance of competences key to national defence over the long term. The levers that define this policy are of several types:

• Direction given to defence research and innovation via the Defence innovation agency (Agence de l’innovation de Défense—AID),

• Governance of industrial firms through administration committees for public concerns or by investment from the Definvest fund,

• Establishment of cooperation policies for armament programmes and for industrial organisation, an example being MBDA,

• Procurement policy by public orders in the fields of innovation as well as in armament programmes and operations,

• Support to exports via the network of armament attachés in our embassies and at high-level meetings,

• Support to SME through the SME action plan to ease their access to the armed forces’ Ministry’s markets by simplifying procedures, helping them to export, guiding them in their requests for European funding and looking after their contractual relationships with the major leading groups in the defence markets.

The main players in the aerospace DTIB⁽⁷⁾

The French aerospace industry employs 195,000 staff in France and had a turnover of 65.4 billion euros in 2018,⁽⁸⁾ of which, 77 per cent came from the civil sector and 85 per cent was from exports. Dassault Aviation and the Airbus, Thales and Safran groups are the principal system engineers and integrators within the defence aerospace industry. Directly or via cooperation between companies they therefore constitute the fundamental structure of the ecosystem.

Airbus, the biggest aerospace and defence group in Europe,⁽⁹⁾ is organised into three divisions:

– Airbus Commercial Aircraft, in charge of commercial aircraft.

– Airbus Helicopters (AH), world leader in civil and public service helicopters (40 per cent of the market), and 4^th in the world for military helicopters.

– Airbus Defence & Space (ADS) is built around 4 main areas of interest: military aircraft, space, pilotless air systems and communication-intelligence-security. ADS is world number two for satellites.⁽¹⁰⁾ Its flagship defence programmes are the A400M transport aircraft, the multi-role tanker transport A330 MRTT, the European MALE drone (Medium Altitude, Long Endurance), and for our foreign partners, the Eurofighter.

Dassault Aviation (DA)⁽¹¹⁾ is one of the world leaders in business aviation with its Falcon range, but is above all the project manager for the Rafale combat aircraft for which development of standard 4 is underway. DA’s competence extends also to aircraft (Atlantique 2), for missions of intelligence gathering and maritime patrol, and to combat drones with the European cooperative technological demonstrator nEUROn.

The Safran group⁽¹²⁾ has broadly three main areas of activity:

– Propulsion: military engines (M88 for Rafale and TP400 for the A400M) and civil ones (CFM56, LEAP with the US company General Electric), turbojets (helicopters and cruise missiles) and electrical propulsion for satellites.

– Aeronautical equipment (in particular pods, undercarriage, electrical systems, power transmissions and cabling), which includes a wide range of the activities of Zodiac, whose purchase and merger was successfully achieved at the beginning of 2018.

– Defence and electronics: inertial navigation, optronics, avionics and defence  systems, in particular AASM,⁽¹³⁾ and the Sperwer and Patroller drone systems.

ArianeGroup,⁽¹⁴⁾ a Franco-German company and subsidiary of Safran and ADS, was created on 1 July 2016 on merger of the launch activities of the two owning companies. With it, France has a European and world-level champion in the field of launchers which gives it independent access to space. It is also the project manager for the M51 ballistic missile, one of the pillars of French deterrence.

Thales is the main European industry in the defence electronics sector.⁽¹⁵⁾ The group’s skills range from supply of components, equipment and subsystems to systems project management in strategic areas such as EW, tactical communications and missile electronics. It is also developing its activity in civil aeronautics as a supplier of civil and military Flying Management System (FMS) equipment.

A world player in satellites, Thales Alenia Space (TAS)⁽¹⁶⁾ provides, as does ADS, management of both space and ground components of satellite systems. These two specialists are now associated in the creation of our most recent independent capabilities.⁽¹⁷⁾

This all-round look at the great masters of integration would not be complete without mention of the missile company, MBDA.⁽¹⁸⁾ Present in four European countries (France, United Kingdom, Italy and Germany), it equips all European aircraft with the Meteor long-range air-air missile. MBDA is driving hard for stronger integration between France and the United Kingdom with centres of excellence that lead to mutual dependence, a successful example of controlled rationalisation of industry on the European level.

DTIB challenges in aeronautics

Civil aeronautical activity is growing strongly and has to deal with increasing its delivery rate to match that of worldwide air traffic. Taking into account the global situation, reduction in the environmental impact of each aircraft is a specific challenge that puts engine manufacturers under the spotlight. Such challenges are not limited to big companies, as they affect the entire sub-contracting chain with its associated financial and HR investments.

The increasing number of aircraft poses questions on adaptation of the associated MRO workload.⁽¹⁹⁾ Through the Directorate of aeronautical maintenance (Direction de la maintenance aéronautique—DMAé), the armed forces Ministry is committed to restructuring the industrial landscape of military aeronautical support. It remains to be seen if the same will apply to the civil sector, in which industrial concerns are reforming and in which aircraft fleets are growing.

With regard to combat aviation the challenges are many: short-term ability across the entire production chain to satisfy export clients by an increase in production rate and adaptation of industry needed to respond to the demands of offset linked to exports, whilst at the same time maintaining over the medium term the key design office skills required on a European scale for the Future combat air system (FCAS, Système de combat aérien du futur—SCAF). Among other things, the latter will be composed of a new combat aircraft, the New Generation Fighter (NGF), which will be outfitted with advanced survivability and manoeuvrability capabilities that will call upon brand new technologies including artificial intelligence (AI) to assist its aircrew in understanding the combat picture and taking the right decisions. The NGF will be accompanied by unmanned remote carriers that have a degree of autonomy. FCAS will have to provide the political decision-maker with freedom of action through its ability to acquire and maintain air superiority in post-2040 conflict situations. Spain has recently joined what was begun as a Franco-German bilateral project, whose success will depend among other things on the capability to build industrial agreements that respect requirements for sovereignty and are concerned for the best use of established competences, yet are open to new technologies and industrial innovation.

The helicopter sector is being severely hit by a reduction in demand from the oil rig business and is relying on renewal of the range of helicopters currently in service. Development of the H160, successor to the Dauphin family, has meant that engineering expertise has been retained in the civil field within AH and its main partners, Thales for modular avionics and Safran Helicopter Engines for the turbine engines. The helicopter of the future will be driven by the civil need, from which defence can benefit: increased speed without detriment to payload, reduced environmental impact, better noise reduction reduced operating cost and more. The move to standard 3 of the Tigre, the development of a Special Forces version of the NH90 and work on the forth-coming HIL⁽²⁰⁾ will in the short and medium terms mean we can keep our design office competences up to better levels in matters regarding the strictly defence sector, such as self-protection, weapon and fire control integration and sensors. The MALE Eurodrone programme being developed in cooperation with Germany, Italy and Spain is important for the sector and will offer Europe control over the intelligence that is so important for its independence of appreciation of a situation and decision. Through this project the DTIB has to demonstrate its capability to enter the worldwide order of battle in this highly competitive sector.

The technological studies in the SDAM⁽²¹⁾ project for vertical take-off drones will capitalise on the competences of a particular SME, Guimbal, which is an excellent example of SME creativity, and will bring together the bigger project leaders, AH and Naval Group, with the support of Thales and Safran.

DTIB challenges in space

The worldwide positions won by TAS and ADS through their competences are being called into question by the increasing number of new players in Europe, with OHB, and also by private interests in New Space. The French DTIB nevertheless has the capability to respond to these challenges, for example through the work being conducted by CNES in cooperation with Nexeya that aims to provide a nano-satellite platform able to fulfil requirements of future constellations, and by the gamble taken on by ADS to industrialise satellite production (OneSat). Accepting that image resolution has limits, reduction in delays to revisit a point and correlation of information from different wavelengths are operational challenges of greater importance to defence space observation. The technological challenges that will have to be met relate in particular to digitisation of satellites and their payloads, optical telecommunications, technologies that bring operational superiority (especially infrared, hyperspectral imaging, penetrating radar frequencies, waveforms and accuracy of positioning), and those that contribute to the resilience of our operational systems, such as anti-jamming. Which is not to forget other technologies that will ensure the integrity and durability of our assets such as those relating to orbiting services.

For its part, ArianeGroup has to face up to reduced costs of launch that have appeared with players in New Space who benefit from sizeable institutional contracts incomparable with European industry. That will be Ariane 6’s short-term challenge.

Research into hypervelocity is now a technological challenge that has to be followed up thoroughly. Solutions will draw on studies by ONÉRA on supersonic propulsion and super-ramjets. ArianeGroup, responding to a DGA requirement, is getting ready for the challenge to produce a manoeuvring hypervelocity glider demonstrator (V-max).

* * *

The French aerospace DTIB is flourishing. It includes not only the major industrial companies but also the precious ETI and SME that are permanent sources of innovation. As ever, the big boys overshadow the small ones but it is only when they all work together as an ecosystem that they can collectively rise to the challenges.

The project managers of the DTIB are European leaders who justify prime places in cooperative programmes such as the European MALE drone and the FCAS.

Cooperation is explicitly sought after by France and is all the more encouraged on a European level with the establishment of Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) and the European Defence Fund (EDF), which are leading to identification of common technological and capability priorities and substantial funding for collaborative projects.⁽²²⁾ Cooperation between states implies the same between their companies and will bring with it industrial rapprochement. Such industrial consolidation has strategic, economic, technological and operational interest and helps achieve European sovereignty.

We will first have to work towards creating added value in Europe that will be shared across our increased independence, operational and technological superiority, export competitiveness and employment. Whatever happens, the opportunities afforded to the French DTIB must be seized upon to strengthen the major industrial groups and the entire ecosystem that surrounds them. ♦

(1) Plan d’action pour la croissance et la transformation des entreprises (Action plan for growth and transformation of businesses).
(2) Development of Rafale started in 1986, with entry into active service in 2001 for the first standards.
(3) Entreprises de taille intermédiaire (ETI)=Intermediate-sized enterprises; SME=Small and Medium Enterprises.
(4) Office national d’études et de recherches aérospatiales (ONÉRA)=National office for aerospace studies and research; Centre national d’études spatiales (CNES)= National centre for space studies.
(5) Technology Readiness Level.
(6) Typical examples would be aeronautical propulsion and the link between space launchers and ballistic missiles, for which R&D enjoys significant cross-fertilisation.
(7) This list is not exhaustive: the reader is asked to excuse the simplification made here.
(8) Source: Groupement des industries françaises aéronautiques spatiales (GIFAS), the French aerospace industries association.
(9) With nearly 130,000 employees and a turnover in 2018 of 63.7 billion euros.
(10) In 2017 the turnover in space matters was of the order of 3 billion euros, with activity divided across three countries, France, Germany and the United Kingdom.
(11) In 2018 DA’s turnover was 5 billion euros, and it had 11,400 employees.
(12) Safran’s turnover was 21 billion euros in 2018 (including Zodiac Aerospace’s share) and it employs over 55,000 staff in 57 countries of which, 35,000 in France.
(13) Armement air-sol modulaire (Modular air-ground armament).
(14) With turnover of around 3.6 billion euros in 2018, ArianeGroup employs 9,000 staff, mainly in France, but also in Germany.
(15) Defence activity before acquisition of Gemalto, represented about half its turnover of 15.86 billion euros in 2018. The group employs some 64,900 people across the world, of which 34,500 in France.
(16) TAS, a joint enterprise of Thales (67 per cent) and the Italian Leonardo (33 per cent), has a turnover of some 2.4 billion euros and over 7,500 employees.
(17) On CSO (Composante spatiale optique—space optical component), Syracuse IV and CÉRES (Capacité d’écoute et de renseignement électromagnétique spatiale—capability for listening and gathering of electromagnetic intelligence from space).
(18) A subsidiary of ADS (37.5 per cent), BAE systems (37.5 per cent) and Leonardo (25 per cent), MBDA employs 10,500 people and has a turnover of 3.2 billion euros.
(19) Maintenance, repair & overhaul.
(20) The Hélicoptère interarmée léger (HIL), the light joint helicopter, is derived from the H160 and will be produced in several standards.
(21) Système de drone aérien pour la Marine (Air drone system for the Navy).
(22) The EDF could receive some 13 billion euros for the period 2021 to 2027.