Leonardo and the Turkish one Baykur are preparing to sign a partnership next week for the production of military drones and also the Saudi sovereign fund PIF aims to enter the game.
Il Financial Times he anticipated that Leonardo and Baykar have on the table a Memorandum of Understanding preparatory to the establishment of a Join Ventures, based on the partnership signed between Leonardo and Rheinmetall, but this time for the production of drones and remotely piloted systems, both for the civil and military markets, on the European and Middle Eastern markets. Bloomberg He also reported that the Saudi sovereign fund PIF, whose representatives visited Leonardo's four aerostructures plants in southern Italy yesterday, aims to co-invest with Leonardo and Baykar in the production of drones.
Il title Leonardo, this morning added another +3,17% to its prices at 38,70 euros. The stock has gained 74% in the last 6 months.
Baykar world leader in AI-based drones
Leonardo is very advanced in the electronics field but in the field of unmanned devices it only has the “Falco” family, while Baykar — of which it is co-owner Selcuk Bayraktar, son-in-law of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan — is one of the global leaders in drone manufacturing based onartificial intelligence, back The Courier. Its flagship, “TB2”, is used mainly by the Turkish defense forces. 90% of the company's revenue comes from exports: of the 2 billion dollars in revenue in 2023, 1,8 billion come from the sale of products to 35 other countries.
“We are negotiating to understand whether industrial synergy can begin or not, focusing on the complementarity between Turkish aircraft and our electronic systems,” said Leonardo CEO Roberto Cingolani in January after a visit to the Baykar facilities east of Istanbul, in the European part of Türkiye.
In the background there is also the theme of Italian armed forces who are working on a modernization, also in light of the geopolitical context that has changed in recent months and with a significant acceleration since Donald Trump has returned to the White House. For weeks there has been talk of an order of 1.100-1.300 drones by theItalian army, although Leonardo sources underline that at the moment there have been no official contacts.
The Italian-Turkish agreement would follow the model of the partnership with Rheinmetall to build new tanks and combat vehicles. And it would precede by a few months the European alliance of Leonardo with Airbus and Thales on satellites to compete with the United States and China. The Italian defense giant is also part of the trio with the British Bae Systems , Japanese Jaiec for the design, development and implementation of a fighter jet next-generation aircraft under the “Global combat air programme”. In the meantime, the company also announced that it has signed an agreement with EdgeThe agreement, signed during the International Defence Exhibition (Idex) 2025, currently underway in Abu Dhabi, will concern the United Arab Emirates market and will include a global export strategy
On the Turkish side, Bayktar won the tender for the acquisition of Piaggio Aerospace and last year it started industrial production of the Kizilelma unmanned combat aircraft. According to Straits Research, in 2024 the Global military drone market has reached a value of $21,8 billion and is expected to grow from $24,3 billion this year to $56,7 billion by 2033.
