Rome, 17 September, 2024 -The OCCAR-EA Director, Mr. Joachim Sucker, was honoured to be invited by Italy to participate and contribute to the second European Integrated Air and Missile Defence Conference held in Rome. The symposium provided the perfect stage to discuss strategic, operational and industrial topics related to Air and Missile Defence capabilities in Europe with the objective of fostering European initiatives for more efficient and interoperable European integrated Air Defence capabilities.
Accompanied by the OCCAR FSAF-PAAMS Programme Manager, Mr. Francis Celeste, the OCCAR-EA Director presented the extensive involvement and contributions made by OCCAR in this field for over 20 years through the management of several programmes with the successful deliveries to several Nations (France, Italy and UK) of combat proven ground and naval systems built around the Aster missiles.
Faced with the current global context and the continuous improvement of those capabilities to face emerging threats, Mr. Sucker presented the new developments, such as the Medium-Range Air-Defence ground systems SAMPT1 New Generation (SAMPT NG) and the Aster 30 B1 New Technology (Aster 30 B1NT) which OCCAR manages for France and Italy, as well as the OCCAR managed technological studies HYDIS and HYDEF for future missiles co-funded by the European Union (EU) through the European Defence Fund (EDF).
Mr. Sucker highlighted OCCAR´s demonstrated overall ability on behalf of Nations to successfully contribute to further increase the development of crucial synergies within the European Industrial defence base through its various complex cooperative defence programmes currently managed by OCCAR on a Through Life Management basis. The Director invited other European Nations to trust OCCAR to cooperate on the development of their capabilities.
During this conference, the French Minister of the Armed Forces, Mr. Sébastien Lecornu, officially announced the contract placed by OCCAR in July 2024 to order to EUROSAM (MBDA and Thales), 7 ground SAMPT NG sections for the French Air Force. With this order, EUROSAM will have to deliver through OCCAR 18 SAMPT NG sections in total for France (French Air Force) and Italy (Italian Army & Air Force), in the coming years.
The conference was closed by Mr. Lecornu and the Italian Minister of Defence, Mr. Guido Crosetto, who underlined the importance of continued dialogue at this conference and the efforts to further develop and increasing the ability to produce such air defence capabilities, particularly given the current geopolitical context.
1: Système Sol Air Moyenne portée Terrestre in French.