Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace

Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace

Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace AS (KDA), one of two operating companies of Kongsberg Gruppen (KOG) of Norway, is a supplier of defence and space related systems and products, mainly anti-ship missiles, military communications, and command and weapons control systems for naval vessels and air-defence applications. Today, the company is probably best known abroad for its development/industrialisation and production of the first passive IR homing anti-ship missile of the western world, the Penguin, starting delivery in the early 1970s (when KDA was part of KOG's predecessor Kongsberg Våpenfabrikk). The latest product which attracts huge interest is the PROTECTOR M151 Remote Weapon Station which is fielded by the US Army (main armament of the Stryker ICV Vehicle), the Canadian Army and the Australian Army. As of 2005, Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace had 1,421 employees.

Space related activities are conducted within KDA itself in addition to its subsidiaries, Kongsberg Spacetec (wholly owned) and Kongsberg Satellite Services (50% owned by KDA, 50% by the Norwegian Space Centre), both located in Tromsø. Notable space related products from KDA are the Booster Attachment and Release Mechanisms for ESA's Ariane 5. In the early 1990s KDA was involved with NASA's JPL and Germany's DASA in software development of the test/checkout system, as well as spacecraft hardware production, for the NASA/ESA Cassini-Huygens space probe. KDA has also delivered the Solar Array Drive Mechanism for ESA's Rosetta space probe.

On 22 November 2008 Norwegian Minister of Defence Anne-Grete Strøm-Erichsen opened a new KDA plant that will produce parts for the aircraft recently chosen as Norway's future fighter, the F-35 Lightning II.

In October 2010, Kongsberg signed an agreement with Rheinmetall on joint development of remote weapons systems.