The burgeoning drone manufacturer, Helsing, is poised for rapid industrial scaling, according to its co-founder and CEO, Gundbert Scherf, presenting a stark reassessment of European defense capabilities and highlighting potential vulnerabilities. In an interview with the Süddeutsche Zeitung, Scherf declared the company’s readiness to transition to mass production, projecting a capacity to manufacture between 10,000 and 20,000 drones within the next year, with ambitions to reach a capacity of hundreds of thousands by 2027, necessitating a significant new production facility.
This aggressive expansion underscores a growing recognition of the shifting geopolitical landscape, particularly in light of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine. Scherf emphasized that the war has entered a new phase, moving beyond traditional armored warfare to one increasingly defined by technological innovation – software, artificial intelligence, drones, robotics and satellite technology. He warned that Europe’s conventional defense systems are ill-equipped to counter novel threats, citing recent drone incursions over Munich and Brussels as evidence of this deficiency.
A critical element of Helsing’s strategy involves leveraging the current crisis within the automotive industry. Facing production slowdowns, automotive suppliers represent a readily available and largely untapped resource. Scherf explicitly stated that these suppliers represent “Germany’s strategic reserve” largely underutilized during the broader ” Zeitenwende” (a policy shift towards increased self-reliance) and that they possess the capacity for rapid production scale-up, making them “natural partners” for Helsing. The possibility of utilizing existing automotive supplier plants in the future was also raised.
However, the rapid expansion is not without its challenges. Scherf highlighted the crucial need to secure access to large quantities of raw materials and semiconductors, stressing that supply chain resilience is paramount. This demand places additional pressure on already strained global supply networks.
Beyond the technical and logistical hurdles, Helsing’s rapid ascent and the implications of its production plan also raise deeper political questions concerning Europe’s reliance on nascent technologies for defense and the strategic implications of outsourcing critical defense component manufacturing to a sector experiencing its own struggles. The prospect of utilizing automotive supplier infrastructure, while expedient, raises questions about potential conflicts of interest and the long-term sustainability of such a dependency. Ultimately, Scherf’s pronouncements serve as a stark reminder of Europe’s vulnerability and the urgent need for a fundamental reassessment of its defense posture in the face of increasingly sophisticated hybrid warfare tactics employed by Russia.