NAD and CDS want capability delivered faster as DSEI 27 launched
The National Armaments Director and the Chief of the Defence Staff urge faster capability delivery, greater innovation, and improved readiness.
Pictured (L-R): Rupert Pearce, National Armaments Director and Air Chief Marshal Knighton, Chief of the Defence Staff, speak to Rear Admiral Jon Pentreath (ret’d), Military Advisor DSEI UK, to launch DSEI UK 27 - Delivering the Integrated Force
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Rupert Pearce and Chief of the Defence Staff (CDS) Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton have jointly launched DSEI UK 2027, under the theme Delivering the Integrated Force.
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National Armaments Director Rupert Pearce has warned the UK and its allies have until “the end of 2030, at best, to deter and be ready to fight”.
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DSEI UK, the flagship biennial defence exhibition, is expected to attract 65,000 visitors and up to 1,700 exhibiting companies to ExCeL London in September 2027.
National Armaments Director Rupert Pearce, and Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton KCB, Chief of the Defence Staff, have jointly launched DSEI UK 2027: Delivering the Integrated Force.
Mr Pearce, who is responsible for defence acquisition and industrial capability, warned that the UK and its allies have just over four years to prepare for conflict.
Rupert Pearce, National Armaments Director, said:
This is the time for us to focus on accelerated delivery. We have until the end of 2030, at best, to deter and be ready to fight. DSEI UK is a perfect time for the different stakeholders to come together and to figure out how we can do this together at pace.
Setting out his approach to building up the UK’s defences by creating “an innovation engine which horizon scans for new technologies and capabilities, advances them and matures them”.
Mr Pearce explained:
We need to build our core capabilities in a way which allows them to be infused with future innovation.
That is the perfect discussion to have at DSEI UK with all the stakeholders together: military, industry, procurement agencies, innovators and the finance community… If we get that right at DSEI UK we will position the UK Armed Forces in a vanguard of being the most innovative armed forces in the world.
CDS and Mr Pearce have issued a clear challenge to the defence sector, across UK and allied nations, as plans for DSEI UK 2027 were unveiled.
CDS, the most senior UK military officer, explained that the UK and its allies were in a race with potential hostile states to gain the battlespace advantage as tensions rise across the globe. Speaking about plans for the event, CDS warned of the need for nations to prepare at speed.
Sir Richard said:
Fundamentally this is a race, we have to be faster and better than our adversaries. That is going to happen if we can bring together industry, science and technology and the war fighters as well as those responsible for acquisitions and that is what DSEI does.
DSEI UK is the flagship, biennial defence event that is expecting 65,000 visitors and sees up to 1,700 companies showcase developed and in-service capability to the global defence market of military buyers.
DSEI UK 2027 takes place from 7–10 September 2027 at ExCeL London.