Dr Tomka Barnabás

You can offshore electronics.You can offshore EV battery plants.You cannot offshore defence.Why?You don’t outsource critical systems to geopolitical competitors;You don’t manufacture complex military tech in low-cost regions;You can’t recreate decades of aerospace and defence culture elsewhere;And defence demand is government-backed, it doesn’t vanish overnight.This is why defence & aerospace are becoming Europe’s new industrial backbone.But here is the uncomfortable truth:An industry is only as strong as its supply chain.And Europe’s supply chain is the weakest part of the system.

Europe didn’t wake up one morning and decide to love defence. Politicians woke up and finally realised it had lost half of its industrial base.A few data points:Europe once produced over 25% of the world’s semiconductors.Today: less than 10%.Europe dominated the mobile industry (Nokia, Ericsson, Siemens).Today: practically 0%.Europe produced 50%+ of the world’s solar panels in 2007.Today: less than 3%.So where can Europe still be among the leaders?Yes, these are defence, aerospace and high-complexity engineering.These sectors won’t disappear like smartphones...

Europe is not only investing billions in defence because it simply wants to. Europe is investing because we have no other choice.After losing major industrial positions in telecoms, electronics, chips and increasingly automotive Europe needs a sector where it still has:world-class engineering;export competitiveness;state-backed long-term demand;and protection against offshoring.That sector is: Defence & Aerospace.And whether Europe succeeds will not depend on budgets but on something far more fragile: a supply chain that must scale faster than ever before.This is where the future...

Europe is not only rearming because of a potential war. Europe is doing it because we need a new success industry to survive. In the last 20 years, #Europe has lost more industrial ground than in any previous decade: - 40% of its semiconductor production; - 80–90% of its consumer electronics manufacturing; - almost its entire mobile device industry; - and now its automotive leadership is under pressure. So Europe is now turning to one of the last industries where it...