Joint national office for NGWS/FCAS program gets underway

Indra’s new headquarters in Alcobendas, Spain, for the Next-Generation Weapon System/Future European Combat Air System (NGWS/FCAS) recently hosted the first meeting of the National Joint Office of the program, chaired by the Secretary of State for Defence, Amparo Valcarce. The NGWS/FCAS Joint National Office will be made up of representatives of the Ministry of Defense program office and Spanish industry, the latter led by Indra as the national coordinator. Indra Chairman Marc Murtra welcomed the participants to the event, which was also attended by the company’s CEO, José Vicente de los Mozos, as well as some of the leading representatives for the program of Airbus, ITP Aero and SATNUS (consortium formed by GMV, Sener y Tecnobit-Grupo Oesía). The Secretary of State for Defence brought the event to an end. A visit was then made to Indra’s new facilities for the NGWS/FCAS program. The event was followed by the first technical meeting of the new Joint Office with the Spanish companies participating in the NGWS/FCAS. “The government has made a firm commitment to participating at the same level as France and Germany in the FCAS program. The huge investment made by the Government must be matched by a program structure for the industrial sector allowing it to act with a single voice on the international stage, protecting our interests and highlighting your capabilities. The creation of a permanent coordination bureau will make it possible to give unity of action to the national aspect of the program”, declared Amparo Valcarce, Secretary of State for Defence. “The emphasis that the program seeks to place on driving innovation and the development of emerging and/or disruptive technologies, many of them dual, is very important for Indra, as it facilitates the involvement of an innovative ecosystem made up of small innovative companies, universities and research organisations, many of them non-traditional actors in the field of defence. Collaboration is therefore an essential word to define FCAS in all its aspects”, stated Marc Murtra, Chairman of Indra. “Given that this program is essential for Indra, I’ll be making organizational improvements with immediate effect. To guarantee these improvements, I’ll personally take the lead of the program as the top executive. “And, of course, we’ll promote the FCAS Industrial Plan in a decisive manner. In this way we’ll also respond to the paradigm shift with Indra, the leader of a new model of national industrial collaboration set to make us stronger. With this goal in mind, I intend to meet with all the companies in the program’s ecosystem in the coming months. It’s essential for us to work together on our relationship model, and it’s vital for all of us to understand and share the same values and visions”, indicated José Vicente de los Mozos, Indra’s CEO. The NGWS/FCAS program represents a shared success for Spanish industry, which has consolidated an equal position in terms of the quantity and quality of the work to be tackled by the French and German industry partners. This important participation will give a strong boost to the entire Spanish business and innovative fabric, as it will require the incorporation of SMEs, universities, technology and research centers from all over the country into the project. Early participation in the maturation of a wide range of dual technologies beyond the state of the art will have a major impact on the entire value chain of Spanish industry, improving its competitiveness, promoting the digital transformation of the sector, and achieving a role of maximum importance in Europe. In this regard, Indra, as national coordinator, also works to ensure the maximum return of the program for our country and to guarantee national sovereignty over the technologies that the Ministry of Defence has defined as critical. Phase 1B, launched in late 2022, will also represent an opportunity for the development of the company’s talent and technological capabilities with the creation of more than 1,000 highly-skilled jobs in Spain, more than 400 of them at Indra, together with all the indirect jobs generated through subcontracting, purchases and related services. Spain will participate in 33% of the technological developments of the entire program, leading some of the key activities. In addition to its role as the Spanish industrial coordinator of the NGWS/FCAS, Indra internationally leads the sensor pillar and co-leads the two transversal pillars, besides leading the combat cloud pillar in Spain. For Editorial Inquiries Contact: Editor Kym Bergmann at [email protected] For Advertising Inquiries Contact: Director of Sales Graham Joss at [email protected]