The European Defence Agency (EDA) awards AITEX, as consortium leader, the framework contract for the provision of services in the field of “NBC Protection Research and Technology”.

The European Union has approved its first-ever defence research budget, estimated at more than 7 billion euros for the period 2021-2027. The budget has been designed to foster an innovative and competitive industrial base to increase Europe’s military autonomy.

In order to implement the programme, Brussels designed a pilot programme called the Preparatory Action on Defence Research (PADR), to test the ability of European companies to undertake defence research projects.

AITEX is one of a handful of Spanish entities to lead a project within the initiative. Our R&D team is working on the development of the VESTLIFE project, through which the Institute has developed ballistic protection vests and which enables the European Commission to test how defence research can be integrated into its R&D programmes.

AITEX already has dedicated research lines developing protective textiles against a range of hazards such as the detection, identification and monitoring of NBC risks. The EDA awarded AITEX the framework contract for the provision of services in the field of “NBC Protection Research and Technology”.

The overall objective of the contract is to facilitate the implementation of the agency’s strategic research agenda in NBC protection, and to support the development of the projects it outlines. To this end, the AITEX-led consortium brings together all the experience and knowledge necessary to provide the expertise to properly implement the tasks envisioned by the contract and in addition, the Institute will evaluate the impact of COVID-19 on the implementation of the strategic research agenda.

The new contract is a continuation of AITEX’s successful collaboration with the EDA. Since 2012, the Institute has developed seven R&D projects for the Agency and this contract ensures that collaboration will run for another four years.