EU touts ‘paradigm shift’ in defence as it inaugurates new fund

The European Commission has formally launched an €8 billion European Defence Fund (EDF), a new instrument designed to co-finance collaborative defence research and development projects across the bloc.

The new funding instrument will see European cooperation in defence “become the norm,” said Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton at its launch on Wednesday (30 June).

“Public authorities will spend better together, and companies – big or small – from all member states will benefit, resulting in more integrated European defence industrial value chains,” added Breton, whose portfolio also includes defence industry and space.

According to Breton, with the new funding instrument, European cooperation in defence “will become the norm”.

The fund is “an absolutely essential contribution to greater European sovereignty,” the Commissioner added, and said the EU must aim to “gradually become a security actor at world level.”

First proposed under former European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker, the fund’s budget was initially slated at €13 billion, but was subsequently slashed by €5 billion in last year’s EU budget negotiations as a casualty of the pandemic.

In what was seen as a difficult birth, EU lawmakers had approved the €7.9 billion fund, clearing the way for the bloc’s first-ever dedicated programme for military research. However, a number of ethical questions, including parliamentary control and semi-autonomous weapons systems, remain.

The idea is to finance defence cooperation projects leading to technological innovations and ‘home-grown’ European systems, both with large companies, small businesses and start-ups.

Funding disruptive technologies

The first call for 23 projects amounting to €1.2 billion was launched earlier this year, of which €700 million is to be devoted to large-scale projects such as the development of future combat aircraft, a ground vehicles fleet, digital and modular ships, and ballistic missile defence.

The rest will be used to fund quantum technologies and additive manufacturing – 3D printing – as well as specific open calls for SMEs and startups.

Of this, €100 million is set to be put aside for projects involving “critical technologies” such as artificial intelligence and cloud for military operations, semiconductors in the field of infrared and radio frequency components.

Civilian space technology will receive €50 million, with €70 million going to medical response and €100 million for cyber capability development.