On Tuesday, Defense Minister Klaudia Tanner opened the “Fortissimo” symposium in Langenlebarn in Lower Austria together with Finance Minister Magnus Brunner. The two ministers then visited the station operations on site. Research projects on drone detection, tracking and defense as well as projects for protection against individual drones and swarms of drones were also presented.
The symposium is an interministerial event on the topic of defense research. The national defense research program FORTE (Research and Technology) is a sub-area of defense research and a springboard for joint European projects.
“We began cooperating with other agencies in the military and civilian sectors years ago: In training, operations, the procurement of military equipment and, of course, in the field of research. Because one thing is clear: excellent research and development today is only possible through networking, joint projects and joint action,” said Defense Minister Klaudia Tanner. “From the war in the Ukraineforest fires and avalanches, from mudslides to floods, from fighting pandemics to food and water supply. Numerous crisis scenarios characterize the work of the Armed Forces and influence us on a daily basis. They shape and preoccupy people,” says Finance Minister Magnus Brunner. Brunner continued: “In order to be able to react to crisis scenarios in the best possible way, a good interplay of many factors is required. Defense research makes an important contribution to this. FORTE is a cornerstone of our national security strategy and proof of our commitment to continuously strengthening our defense capabilities. Since its launch in 2018, FORTE has made significant progress in preparing our Armed Forces for the challenges of modern times. The initiatives presented today are just some of the 58 projects funded by the BMF in FORTE with 24.6 million euros to date.” https://militaeraktuell.at/gdels-steyr-elbit-crossbow-moerser-fuer-den-pandur/ FORTE has been in existence for six years and provides five million euros in research funding every year as part of a competitive research program. As the Federal Ministry of Defense is the only body responsible for defense research, the research priorities are also defined by the military. In the past five calls for proposals, 123 projects were submitted and 58 of them were funded. The deadline for the sixth, current call was the end of March and 33 projects were submitted. An independent jury of experts will then decide which projects will be funded by the end of June. The main areas of research here are digitalization, cyber defence, electronic warfare, space technology for military applications and defence measures against NBC agents and unconventional explosive devices as well as robotics and unmanned systems. Many of these projects have already been further developed within the framework of European cooperation.
The Ministry of Finance (BMF) with its “Security Research and Technology Transfer” staff unit is the program owner of FORTE. With its programs, the BMF offers the security bracket, which in addition to FORTE also includes the civil security research program KIRAS and the cyber security instrument Kypernet-Pass, an opportunity to carry out needs-oriented, innovative research and development. “I would like to encourage Austrian consortia and industry to participate more in European research projects. I would also like to explicitly thank the experts in my office for their excellent work, because research and development only works together with the users in our troops! Without military expertise and testing with the troops on training grounds and in training facilities, national defense research would not work at all,” continued Tanner.
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