Significant EU funding for defence materiel procurement

The Common Armoured Vehicle System (CAVS) project, which is led by Finland, has received EUR 60 million in funding from the European Defence Industry Reinforcement through Common Procurement (EDIRPA) instrument.

The European Commission announced the funded projects in a press release on its website. The CAVS project proposal for EDIRPA funding was prepared by the Finnish defence administration together with Latvia, Sweden and Germany. The funding will be used for multinational cooperation among the countries using CAVS. The project will strengthen European defence and NATO cooperation.

While supporting the progress of the CAVS project, the EDIRPA funding will also boost the defence industry in Finland. The project is open to European countries with similar 6x6 armoured vehicle requirements.

“We succeeded in getting a significant funding for a project initiated by the Finnish Ministry of Defence. This will strengthen our domestic defence industry. It shows that Finnish expertise is appreciated abroad. The CAVS project is exactly the kind of joint undertaking the European defence industry cooperation seeks to achieve. This funding will significantly support the progress of the CAVS project and strengthen multinational defence materiel cooperation in the EU,” Minister of Defence Antti Häkkänen says.

“The CAVS project allows Member States to procure modern armoured vehicles quickly and cost-effectively. Its extensive industrial cooperation within the EU will improve the security of supply and readiness of the EU and the capabilities of the European defence industry. I am proud of the excellent cooperation between Finland and the future CAVS users to develop the armoured vehicles.”

The aim of the CAVS project is to develop modern 6x6 armoured vehicles for the use of the Member States. Sweden joined the project in 2022 and Germany in 2023. Finland has already procured 164 armoured personnel carriers (APC) and entered a contract to procure heavy armoured personnel carriers (HAPC) for crisis management use. Latvia, which joined the project from its start, has procured more than 200 APCs and has recently agreed to procure 56 armoured command and control (C2) vehicles. Last spring Sweden signed an agreement on a total of 321 CAVS vehicles.

“This common procurement project, led by Finland, is a success story for the European defence industry. It reinforces the defence industry in Europe and Finland in concrete ways. New orders are placed all the time, and new jobs are created in Finland. I would like to thank the Defence Ministries of the participating countries for their cooperation and Patria for its high level of professionalism at different stages of the project,” Häkkänen says.

EDIRPA Instrument

The European Defence Industry Reinforcement through Common Procurement (EDIRPA) instrument supports the objective, outlined in the European Defence Industrial Strategy (EDIS), of encouraging Member States to “invest more, better, together, and European”. The EDIS is based on long-term solutions and permanent financial instruments. Currently, defence industry is financed through the European Defence Fund (EDF). In recent years, the EDF has been supplemented with the ASAP instrument to support short-term ammunition production and the EDIRPA instrument to boost common defence procurement.

The EDIRPA instrument has a total budget of EUR 300 million. Its key objective is to support cooperation between the Member States in urgent and critical defence materiel procurement and to increase military materiel assistance to Ukraine.

Inquiries: Niklas Backlund, Senior Specialist, Ministry of Defence, tel. +358 295 140 131, and Brigadier General Engineering Juha-Matti Ylitalo, Deputy Chief, Finnish Defence Forces Logistics Command, tel. +358 299 800 (switchboard).

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