Saab CEO sees Europe streamlining defence demands amid spending push

1/6/2025 14:27

The European defence market needs to align requirements and demand in order to create scale as it attempts to boost capability, t said.



The CEO of Swedish defence group Saab, Micael Johansson, said in an interview on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue security meeting in Singapore, "The important thing is that you cannot have every country, sort of tailoring the requirements to different sorts of versions, then it becomes difficult."



The European Union's 23 members are expected to agree at a summit in June to raise the defence spending target above the current 2% of national output as countries bend to pressure from U.S. President Donald Trump to spend more.



Johansson said, "Europe has a big catch up to do in terms of capability that we need to have in place to take care of our own security," adding that defence capabilities will still need to be built up even if a peace deal in Ukraine is achieved.



Beyond improving capabilities in Europe, he said that he has seen a greater willingness for collaboration between countries other than the U.S. for defence products, and that European players are prepared to establish sovereign capabilities in the countries they partner.