Turkish defense firm Baykar’s CEO urges stronger NATO cooperation on drone capabilities

NATO countries can accelerate the development of unmanned aerial vehicle capabilities by deepening partnerships and combining existing strengths, Baykar CEO Haluk Bayraktar said Tuesday.

Speaking at a panel titled “From Innovation to Mass: Building NATO’s Drone Edge” during the Defense Industry Forum held as part of the 36th NATO Heads of State and Government Summit in Ankara, Bayraktar said the growing role of drones on the battlefield requires shorter development cycles, faster production and large-scale capacity.

“In our approach in Türkiye, for large-scale companies like ours, we do not even wait for demand to emerge to build capacity,” he said. “What we see on the ground shows that there is a major need for these technologies.”

Bayraktar said Baykar currently works with 40 countries, including some NATO members, and wants to further expand its relations with alliance countries.

“Most of our customers are from outside NATO, but we want to build more relations with NATO countries,” he said, adding that Türkiye has developed significant production capabilities in the field.

Baykar is the largest exporter of UAVs, he said, noting that the company has made major investments over the past 25 years in platforms ranging from unmanned combat aircraft to strategic-class systems.

Bayraktar cited the joint venture with Italy’s Leonardo, Leonardo Baykar Aerospace Systems, or LBA Systems, as an example of such cooperation.

“It is much faster to cooperate instead of trying to invent everything from scratch or compete,” he said. “We have our platforms and systems. Leonardo has very strong payloads, radars, electronic systems and different mission payloads.

“It is necessary to create synergy by bringing the best together and combining these capabilities. The main point should be to combine these strengths instead of developing everything from zero.”

Bayraktar said the partnership model does not mainly aim to transfer existing intellectual property, but to develop new technologies jointly.

“Technology sharing can of course happen, but the issue is not sharing intellectual property,” he said. “Under joint ventures, the aim is to create new intellectual property on the existing intellectual property of the parties and build on current capabilities.”

He said building such capabilities from scratch in another country could take decades, while cooperation could allow allies to start developing advanced technology immediately and gain an edge.

FPV capacity should exist in every country

Bayraktar said Türkiye’s defense industry ecosystem has grown significantly over the past two decades.

“Twenty years ago, there were only 17 companies in Türkiye’s defense industry. Today, there are more than 3,000,” he said. “We now make in one week the defense exports that were $250 million in 2002. Our weekly defense exports have reached around $250 million, and the total is over $10 billion.”

He said NATO includes both large and small countries, adding that sharing capabilities and creating synergy would be more efficient than trying to establish the same capacity everywhere from scratch.

Bayraktar also said different production and cooperation models are needed depending on the type of UAV.

“UAVs are increasingly becoming part of our lives and are now among the main elements of war environments,” he said. “There is demand, there is necessity. What we see on the ground clearly shows that these technologies are greatly needed.”

He said UAVs include combat aircraft-class systems, strategic-class platforms and smaller drones, adding that every country should build capacity in first-person view (FPV) drones.

“These are almost like ammunition; every country needs a bullet manufacturer,” he said. “But for combat aircraft-class UAVs, alliances are needed to build this capability. I believe this is much more beneficial.”