Military assistance to Ukraine from Western countries has led to an increase in the revenue of defense contractors.
This is reported by Reuters.
This is due to the fact that the governments of the United States and Europe replenish their weapons after its transfer to Kyiv to protect against Russian invaders.
It is noted that the American defense companies Lockheed Martin and General Dynamics expect the available orders for hundreds of thousands of artillery shells, hundreds of interceptor missiles for Patriot air defense/missile defense systems and a surge in orders for armored vehicles to increase their revenues.
For instance, a division of General Dynamics Combat Systems which produces armored vehicles, tanks and artillery used in Ukraine, experienced an increase in its revenues by almost 25% compared to the same period last year.
“We’ve gone from 14,000 (artillery) rounds per month to 20,000 very quickly. We’re working ahead of schedule to accelerate that production capacity up to 85,000, even as high as 100,000 rounds per month,” Jason Aiken, General Dynamics’ chief financial officer, said.
The American company RTX (Raytheon), which manufactures AIM-120 AMRAAM missiles used in Ukraine in NASAMS air defense systems, said it had already received new orders worth $ 3 billion since Russia’s invasion in February 2022.
Also in the third quarter, sales of Northrop Grumman’s weapons grew by 6% due to high demand for GMLRS family rockets used in the HIMARS and M270 MLRS.
Global trends
Rising profits for defense companies are a global trend.
Thus, the Swedish company Saab raised its full-year sales forecast for its products, and the German concern Rheinmetall reported that profit in the third quarter had increased due to high demand for weapons and ammunition.
At the same time, the leaders of several defense companies also warned that the lack of skilled workers and problems with supply chains of components and materials continue to limit their ability to fulfill growing orders for the production of new weapons.
As previously reported, the Belgian division of the international defense company KNDS delivered to Ukraine thousands of 105mm tank shells for Leopard 1 tanks. They were ordered in June 2023 by the Belgian government in the amount of 32.4 million euros.