Ukraine completing creation of three new joint ventures with European armsmakers

Ukraine is close to setting up three new joint ventures with European weapons producers, and five joint ventures have already been set up.

Ukraine's First Deputy Prime Minister and Economy Minister Yulia Svyrydenko in an interview with Reuters, Ukrinform reports.

Svyrydenko stated that five joint ventures with Western weapon producers had already been set up, including with German and Lithuanian companies.

"We have three more agreements with European companies in the final stages to set up joint ventures," Svyrydenko said, giving no details about the planned new ventures or the scale of the investments.

Several arms producers have opened offices in Ukraine. According to the minister, German weapons producer Flensburger Fahrzeugbau Gesellschaft is building a service center in Ukraine jointly with a private Ukrainian weapons producer.

Svyrydenko said that developing domestic defense production was a boost to the broader economy, which is still smaller than prior to the war despite two years of economic growth.

She added that the weapons production sector accounted for 1.8% of the country's gross domestic product in the first half of 2024, compared with just 0.3% in 2021.

According to Reuters, the Ukrainian authorities are still tight-lipped about details of the defense industry, but President Volodymyr Zelensky said in October that Ukraine could produce four million drones annually and was ramping up its military production, including missiles, a "drone missile" and transport vehicles.

Germany's weapons giant Rheinmetall has already launched its first defense factory in Ukraine, specializing in the maintenance of combat vehicles, with plans to start manufacturing Lynx infantry fighting vehicles by the year's end.

Britain-based BAE Systems, Franco-German KDNS, the Babcock defense and aerospace company and MyDefence, which specializes in counter-drone technology, have teamed up with Ukrainian producers and set up local offices.