NATO kicks off investment programme

The NATO Communication and Information (NCI) agency has kicked off a programme to invest in new cyber, air and missile defence and advanced software capabilities worth a combined €3 billion.

The investments will further strengthen NATO’s cyber and air defence, satellite communications, Response Force, as well as command and control for complex multinational operations.

Contracts will be let between now and 2019 to procure NATO satellite communications worth €1.5 billion, advanced software, and air defence capabilities. The first contracts have already been put out to tender.

Koen Gijsbers, NCI Agency general manager, said: ‘The ingenuity and creativity of our private sector has always been a source of strength for NATO. We, as an alliance, have been able to maintain our technological edge over our adversaries for 67 years because the innovative capacity of our private sector is unparalleled. 

‘Today’s technological change is driven by industry and as NATO we are engaging industry early on to ensure we tap into that creativity. NATO will only be resilient if we embrace and can do continuous, rapid innovation.’

The investment programme follows the Warsaw Summit in early July, which saw heads of state and government welcome the first collective increase in allies’ defence expenditures for the first time since 2009. 

Gijsbers added: ‘The contracts we’re announcing focus on one of the core tasks of the alliance, to connect and link national forces and capabilities into a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. By linking and connecting individual national capabilities NATO can do more that individual countries could do themselves.’