Romania's Aerospace and Defence Market: A Guide for Overseas Suppliers

Overview

Romania is no longer just a south-eastern flank customer for imported equipment. It is becoming a place where NATO rearmament, EU SAFE funding and foreign industrial investment are landing on the ground at the same time. The opportunity is still concentrated rather than broad, but the concentration is the point: Hanwha at Petrești, Rheinmetall at Victoria, Airbus and IAR at Brașov-Ghimbav, Aerostar at Bacău, and US Foreign Military Sales work flowing through F-35, HIMARS, Patriot and Abrams.

Romania is NATO's south-eastern anchor, and across a single calendar quarter in 2025-2026 has become the convergence point for three of Europe's largest non-EU industrial footprints: Korean, with Hanwha Aerospace's first European K9 plant at Petrești; German, with Rheinmetall's largest propellant investment outside Germany at Victoria; and American, with F-35, HIMARS, Patriot and Abrams awards routed through US Foreign Military Sales. Stacked on top of an existing Airbus and Leonardo civil footprint, the result is an unusual density of industrial programme for a country often treated as peripheral.

Romania is where NATO's eastern-flank capability build and EU SAFE funding are converging on a concentrated industrial footprint in a single calendar quarter.

For overseas suppliers, Romania is attractive because major programmes are arriving before the local Tier-2 and Tier-3 base is deep enough to absorb them. The practical openings are in the gaps: land-systems components, propellant and energetics processes, helicopter workshare, MRO tooling, aerostructure parts, avionics, sustainment equipment and factory-build support. Standard items already made by Romarm subsidiaries, Aerostar or IAR will be harder. Suppliers with capacity, specialist process knowledge or a credible industrial-cooperation offer will get further.

Romania's 2025 defence spending stands at approximately 2.45% of GDP, roughly USD 11.2 billion, with President Nicușor Dan committing to reach 5% of GDP (3.5% core plus 1.5% related) within seven years in line with the NATO Hague Summit 2025 framework (Balkan Insight). The EU SAFE (Security Action for Europe) loan instrument has allocated Romania €16.68 billion, the second-largest of 27 recipient states after Poland, approved in the first wave on 15 January 2026 (European Commission). Romanian aerospace adds approximately €300 million in annual economic contribution and around 5,000 skilled workers, with 2024 defence exports of approximately €864 million (KPMG; trade.gov).

Romania hosts two wholly-owned Airbus subsidiaries, both in Brașov County. Airbus Aerostructures Romania at Ghimbav, rebranded on 1 July 2025 from Premium AEROTEC Romania when Airbus brought the Augsburg-Varel-Brașov network under a single brand, employs around 1,100 people (up from roughly 160 in 2014) and produces detail parts and fuselage structures for the full Airbus commercial range and the A400M, with two new halls under construction for completion end 2026 and 100% of output exported (BizBrasov, 1 July 2025). A short drive away sits Airbus Helicopters Romania, inaugurated in 2016 as the industrial partner to IAR Brașov under a 15-year exclusive H215M production and marketing agreement, revised in 2025 to cover the H225M Caracal (Airbus in Romania). Together with IAR Brașov and the Rheinmetall Victoria SA propellant joint venture, the two Airbus sites make Brașov County the densest A&D industrial concentration in the country.

Romania defence spending trajectory 2020-2032 under the 5% of GDP commitment

2020

1.86% of GDP

2021

1.92% of GDP

2022

1.69% of GDP

2023

1.6% of GDP

2024

2.25% of GDP

2025

2.45% of GDP

2026

2.6% of GDP

2027

2.9% of GDP

2028

3.2% of GDP

2029

3.5% of GDP

2030

3.85% of GDP

2031

4.4% of GDP

2032

5% of GDP

Romania defence spending trajectory 2020-2032 under the 5% of GDP commitment

Category	Value
2020	1.86% of GDP
2021	1.92% of GDP
2022	1.69% of GDP
2023	1.6% of GDP
2024	2.25% of GDP
2025	2.45% of GDP
2026	2.6% of GDP
2027	2.9% of GDP
2028	3.2% of GDP
2029	3.5% of GDP
2030	3.85% of GDP
2031	4.4% of GDP
2032	5% of GDP

Major Players

The Romanian A&D base is smaller than France's or Germany's, but it carries a distinctive mix of state armaments holding, publicly listed aerostructures and MRO, wholly-owned Airbus subsidiaries, and three new foreign industrial anchors (Hanwha, Rheinmetall and GDELS) arriving together.

Romarm sits first as the centre of the state defence base: Pirochim Victoria, Mecanica Cugir, Tohan and Carfil between them supply almost every non-imported round the Romanian Army fires. Aerostar and Airbus Aerostructures Romania anchor commercial and regional MRO activity. Hanwha and Rheinmetall Victoria sit ninth and tenth despite their scale because serial production is not yet under way; by 2028 both will rank higher on employment than several rows above them.

Leading sub-sectors

Land Systems and Armoured Vehicles

Romania's land-systems modernisation is the largest single wave of US and Korean armoured-vehicle inflows into any one NATO country in 2024-2025. Four parallel programmes define the pipeline: 54 M1A2 SEPv3 Abrams tanks at approximately USD 1 billion with deliveries from 2026; the 227-vehicle GDELS Piranha V framework at Uzina Mecanică București (UMB); 54 Hanwha K9 Tunetul (Thunder) 155mm self-propelled howitzers plus 36 K10 resupply vehicles; and 54 HIMARS launchers with ATACMS and GMLRS approved at USD 1.25 billion by the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency in December 2024 (US DSCA). Patriot PAC-3 adds seven fire units in Configuration 3+ with PAC-3 MSE interceptors under Raytheon awards of USD 946 million (January 2025) and USD 168 million (December 2025), with full operational capability projected 2028 (RTX).

By 2030, the Hanwha Petrești site could be the anchor of a new European K9 supply chain. Hanwha Aerospace broke ground in March 2025 (Defense Post); the first K9 Tunetul exited the Korean line on 30 March 2026 ready for delivery (Army Recognition); an initial batch of 18 K9 plus 12 K10 lands in 2026 under the July 2024 contract of approximately USD 1 billion (Hanwha); local assembly at Petrești starts from 2027. The model mirrors Hanwha's Polish K2 arrangement: Korean-sourced initial batch, Romanian greenfield, local Tier-2 and Tier-3 feeders spun up over the first two years, and eventual European export content from the Romanian site. The constraint is the depth of the Romanian Tier-2 base: gearboxes, fire-control optronics, torsion bars and drive-train components are not produced at the required standard inside Romania today, and overseas suppliers have two to three years to establish themselves before Hanwha's local-content clock starts ticking hard.

UMB carries the Piranha V workload: 80% of the 227-vehicle framework was complete by June 2025, with Phase 3's 133 vehicles produced entirely at UMB and a further 150 Piranha 5 planned under the 2025 €8 billion upgrade package (Overt Defense). Romarm's Mecanica Cugir, Carfil Brașov and Tohan Zărnești carry small arms, ammunition and sub-assemblies alongside. Aerostar Bacău hosts the first European HIMARS Sustainment Centre, opened in May 2024 under a Lockheed Martin partnership (Lockheed Martin).

Image placeholder: Hanwha Aerospace K9 Tunetul self-propelled howitzer on the production line

Source: Hanwha Aerospace

Overseas suppliers with existing Abrams, Patriot, Piranha or K9 qualifications have a natural bridge. Common categories for overseas content here are armour plate and composites; fire-control and optronics (Elbit is embedded on adjacent programmes); hydraulic and environmental-control sub-systems; precision machining for chassis, torsion bars and final drives; tracked transmissions; MRO tooling; and factory-build equipment for the greenfield sites. Demand is being driven by the SAFE €16.68 billion envelope, earmarked partly for land-systems sustainment and air-defence integration, and the durability given by Romania's forward position on NATO's south-eastern flank.

Munitions, Energetics and Ammunition

Romania is about to host Rheinmetall's largest single propellant investment outside Germany. The Rheinmetall Victoria SA joint venture (Rheinmetall 51%, Pirochim Victoria 49%) will build a greenfield plant at Victoria, Brașov County, for propellant powder and modular artillery charges: construction 2026-2028, capacity 300,000 modular charges and up to 200 tonnes of gunpowder per year, 700 jobs, more than €500 million of investment (Rheinmetall press release, 3 November 2025; Defence Matters). Rheinmetall AG chief executive Armin Papperger and Romanian Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan signed the JV in Bucharest. The plant is sized to meet the EU's 2024-2028 artillery ammunition framework for Ukraine support and NATO replenishment, and positions Romania as a NATO southern-flank large-calibre logistics hub alongside Poland's parallel build-out at Mesko.

Romarm's existing footprint sits alongside the new JV. Pirochim Victoria, the 49% Romanian partner, is the legacy explosives, propellants and nitrocellulose producer and provides the site, workforce and existing production base. Mecanica Cugir in Transylvania covers small arms and 5.56mm / 7.62mm ammunition; Carfil Brașov produces ammunition and optics; Tohan Zărnești handles propellants, pyrotechnics and large-calibre filling; Electromecanica Ploiești covers fuzes and anti-tank mines; UPS Dragomirești produces artillery tubes.

Common categories for overseas content here are propellant precursors and single, double or triple-base powder chemistry; nitrocellulose supply; modular-charge forming equipment; precision machining for artillery bodies; brass and drawn cases; primer compositions; fuze electronics; insensitive munitions process technology; factory-automation and filling-line equipment; and test-range instrumentation. The Victoria site build itself pulls substantial tooling, automation and process-engineering demand before serial production begins. Demand is being driven by Ukraine-driven NATO stockpile replenishment under the EU's 2024-2028 ammunition framework, and Romania's stated positioning as the NATO southern-flank ammunition hub.

Aerostructures, MRO and Aircraft Modernisation

Four anchors share this sub-sector: Airbus Aerostructures Brașov (civil aerostructures), Aerostar Bacău (F-16, Black Hawk and HIMARS MRO), Romaero Băneasa (military transport MRO) and Elbit Systems Romania (IAR-330 Puma and IAR-99 Șoim avionics modernisation). This is where Romania matches Western European aerospace countries on quality, if not on volume.

Airbus completed the integration of Premium AEROTEC's three sites (Augsburg, Varel and Brașov) into Airbus Aerostructures on 1 July 2025, placing the Romanian plant inside a six-factory European network under a single brand (Airinsight). The Brașov site runs at 1,100 employees, with two new halls under construction for completion end 2026, and 100% of output exported into the full Airbus commercial range and the A400M.

Aerostar Bacău is Romania's largest independent A&D company, listed on the Bucharest Stock Exchange under ticker ARS. Government-designated as the F-16 MLU (Mid-Life Update) centre since 2018, Aerostar can work on six F-16s simultaneously, with all Romanian F-16s being upgraded to the M6.6 standard (Aerostar). It is also the first European Black Hawk maintenance hub (opened January 2024, first Phased Maintenance Inspection completed June 2025, Lockheed Martin) and the first European HIMARS Sustainment Centre. Civil aerostructures work for Safran, Boeing and Airbus rounds out the book; Safran accounts for approximately 17% of 2025 sales. 2025 revenues were 634 million lei (approximately €125 million) on 98 million lei of net profit (Bacău.NET). Chairman: Grigore Filip. General director: Alexandru Filip.

Romaero at Bucharest-Băneasa filed for insolvency in January 2024, with debts transferred to the State Assets Administration Authority (AAAS) in June 2024. Restructuring runs alongside a 2024 Marshall Group (UK) partnership for C-130 PDM (Programme Depot Maintenance), first aircraft planned for 2026 (Marshall Group), and an October 2024 cooperation agreement with Poland's WZL-2. Romaero is also the BSDA 2026 host venue. Elbit Systems Romania leads the IAR-330L Puma Phase II modernisation, which integrates Elbit's Spectro XR electro-optical station, BrightNite sensor and HDTS displays: first airframe delivered March 2025, seven airframes total (Militarnyi). Elbit also holds a USD 27 million contract to upgrade 10 IAR-99 Șoim jet trainer avionics (Avioane Craiova operates the platform) and is delivering Watchkeeper X UAVs from 2025 (Jerusalem Post).

Common categories for overseas content here are precision machining of aerostructure parts; composite panel production; specialist coatings; forgings and castings; avionics LRUs; MRO tooling and NDT services; cabin interiors; and ground-support equipment. Aerostar is the most commercially accessible entry: publicly listed, runs Western procurement norms, with Safran at 17% as a customer baseline. Demand is being driven by the 2031 F-35 delivery slot, creating a ten-year Aerostar-and-Romaero capability-build runway for F-35 MRO; SAFE-funded H225M fleet replacement; and the Airbus A320 and A350 ramp pulling on Brașov output.

Helicopters

Romania's helicopter industrial base is defined by one partnership: IAR Brașov and Airbus Helicopters. The 15-year exclusive H215M production and marketing agreement, signed in 2014 and extended in 2025 to cover the H225M Caracal, makes IAR Brașov the sole industrial partner outside France for the Super Puma and Caracal family.

Romania is preparing formal negotiations for 21 Airbus H225M Caracal helicopters under a €1 billion SAFE envelope, partially replacing the ageing IAR-330 Puma fleet, with IAR Brașov as prime contractor (Army Recognition). Two H215M airframes, carrying MBDA Marte ER anti-ship missile integration, are being procured separately through IAR (FlightGlobal).

IAR SA Brașov carries the industrial spine: 50 years of helicopter manufacturing, 65% Ministry of Economy, listed on the Bucharest Stock Exchange under "IARV". 2024 net profit was 32.1 million lei (approximately €6.5 million) on revenue of 381.6 million lei (BizBrasov). Director general: Marian-Iulian Răsăliu. Airbus Helicopters Romania at Ghimbav is the Airbus industrial partner inside the IAR framework. Aerostar Bacău handles Black Hawk MRO and Puma engine-module work. The Romanian Ministry of Interior operates a 12-airframe S-70M Black Hawk fleet (first four delivered 2023), manufactured at PZL Mielec in Poland and maintained at Aerostar, the first European Black Hawk-certified hub.

Common categories for overseas content here are rotor-blade materials and machining tooling; gearbox components; drive-shafts and transmission bearings; avionics LRUs; cabin seats and interiors; and MRO test equipment. The H215M and H225M licence is a direct workshare path for suppliers already on the Super Puma or Caracal supply chain in France. Demand is being driven by the SAFE €1 billion envelope for H225M replacement (21 helicopters negotiated 2026-2027, deliveries late this decade), sustained H215M production for export, and the S-70M MRO ramp at Aerostar.

Space and Satellites

Romania has been a full member of the European Space Agency (ESA) since 2011 and is the only member to have had its voting rights suspended for a period over unpaid arrears. The space sub-sector is smaller than the other four but carries two internationally visible anchors: the Extreme Light Infrastructure Nuclear Physics (ELI-NP) facility at Măgurele, the most powerful laser in the world, and subsystem supply to ESA scientific and earth-observation missions.

Romania's 2025 ESA contribution was cut by approximately 35% at the November 2025 Ministerial Council to allow accumulated arrears of approximately €60 million to be partly settled, with other member states increasing their contributions to make up the difference (ScienceBusiness, 2025; SpacePolicyOnline). The reset is expected to clear the voting-rights question over 2026-2027. Romanian entities have supplied or are supplying content for Juice, Metop-SG, PROBA 3, Euclid, Copernicus, BIOMASS and Hera (ESA Romania).

The institutional anchors are the Romanian Space Agency (ROSA) in Bucharest, which coordinates national and ESA engagement; the National Institute for Aerospace Research "Elie Carafoli" (INCAS) in Bucharest, with aerospace R&D and wind-tunnel capacity; and ELI-NP at Măgurele. The dominant domestic players are small-enterprise: Romanian SMEs feed Thales Alenia Space, OHB and Airbus Defence and Space programmes on subsystem content (thermal control, mechanical subsystems, ground-segment software). There is no Romanian prime at Thales Alenia or OHB level.

Common categories for overseas content here are thermal and optical coatings; small-satellite AIT (assembly, integration and test) support; ground-segment software; and structural composites. Space is small in Romania, and suppliers looking for volume should start in Land Systems or Aerostructures and treat Space as an adjacency. Demand is being driven by the ESA contribution reset, EU Copernicus and Galileo downstream programmes, and Horizon Europe consortia. Romania's ESA position remains politically in motion through 2026-2027.

Opportunities

Overseas-supplier entry into Romanian A&D falls into a stable set of categories: precision-machined engine and gearbox components (Safran at 17% of Aerostar's book is the durable civil-engine example); aerostructure composites and metallic sub-assemblies for the Airbus Brașov range; armoured-vehicle subsystems; munitions components; avionics and EW LRUs; helicopter airframe parts and transmissions; UAV sub-systems; specialist materials; and factory-build equipment for the Petrești and Victoria greenfields. Build-to-print is the norm on legacy MRO; design-to-build opportunities cluster around new programmes (K9 localisation, Puma Phase II, H225M fleet, Piranha V follow-on).

AS9100D and EN 9100 are the civil aerospace baseline at Airbus Aerostructures Brașov, Aerostar, IAR and Romaero. NADCAP applies on special processes (heat treatment, NDT, welding, coatings) for any part flowing into Aerostar's Safran or Boeing work or into Airbus Brașov. NATO AQAP 2110 or 2210 is expected for defence work flowing into Romarm, IAR, Aerostar defence lines or prime contracts with overseas OEMs. EASA Part 21 Production Organisation Approval is required for any civil manufacturer producing design-approved parts. Facility security clearance is administered by the Serviciul Român de Informații (SRI) through ORNISS (Oficiul Registrului Național al Informațiilor Secrete de Stat), with a recognition pathway for NATO member-state facility clearances; paperwork takes six to twelve months. All are company-level credentials. Technical specifications, offset documentation and sustainment documentation typically run in Romanian.

Example offsets

When Romania buys defence equipment from an overseas supplier, the contract typically requires the seller to establish local production, transfer technology, or source supply from Romanian industry. This is called an industrial cooperation commitment, or offset. Under Government Emergency Ordinance 124/2023 (GEO 124/2023, which replaced GEO 189/2002 in November 2023), foreign suppliers on national defence and security public procurement must recoup at least 80% of contract value in Romanian industry, by direct investment or indirect industrial flow. ARCTIS oversees the regime (Lexology).

GEO 124/2023 places Romania alongside Poland and Turkey as one of a small group of European countries with a formal codified offset regime that an overseas supplier must plan for from day one, rather than discover at contract stage. The single most important change in the 2023 reform is that Foreign Military Sales are now in scope. Before GEO 124/2023, FMS was exempt, which hollowed out Romanian industrial returns on US deals. From November 2023, F-35, HIMARS, Abrams and Patriot carry explicit Romanian-industry obligations. If the reader's home country has sold defence equipment to Romania, reciprocal industrial participation opportunities may already be routed through the principal's offset plan; if the principal has not yet committed substantive offset, the reader's capability may be exactly what closes the gap to a compliant 80% flow.

Recent public overseas-supplier entries show the pattern. Hanwha's Petrești K9 plant combines greenfield investment and local production to carry a large share of the Korean K9 and K10 offset (Defense Post). Lockheed Martin's Aerostar HIMARS Sustainment Centre (May 2024) and Black Hawk maintenance hub (January 2024) anchor US industrial return on HIMARS and Black Hawk. GDELS routes the Piranha V framework through UMB in Bucharest. Rheinmetall's Victoria SA JV is the German case of €500 million-plus investment into a Romanian propellant hub. Airbus carries a dual-track presence through Airbus Aerostructures at Brașov and the H215M and H225M licence at IAR. Elbit covers avionics and UAV offset against the Puma, Șoim and Watchkeeper X contracts.

Naval defence is more prospective than active. Naval Group's 2019 Gowind 2500 corvette award was cancelled in August 2023; a 2022 Scorpène submarine letter of intent is dormant; Romania rejoined the European Patrol Corvette PESCO project in 2024, and Damen Galați received designated military shipyard status on 1 July 2025. A material Romanian naval pipeline is more likely on a five to seven-year horizon than a two-year one.

Romania's 2024-2028 procurement wave is outpacing domestic supply-chain capacity. The Piranha V line, the K9 line from 2027, the Victoria SA greenfield from 2028, the Aerostar F-16 and Black Hawk ramps and the H225M fleet build all depend on Tier-2 and Tier-3 feeders that do not yet exist at scale inside Romania. For an overseas supplier with capacity in the right discipline, or a specialism the Romanian base does not hold, this is where the opening sits.

Our Insights

The single most important regulatory fact of the current cycle is that GEO 124/2023 has brought Foreign Military Sales into offset scope at 80%. Before November 2023, US FMS was exempt and Romanian industry picked up very little workshare on large American deals. From November 2023 onward, F-35, HIMARS, Abrams and Patriot carry explicit Romanian-industry obligations. For an overseas supplier with the right capability and principal relationship, this opens workshare on contracts that previously ring-fenced Romanian content out. Suppliers who read GEO 124/2023 at working level get earlier signal on where the offset gaps sit than those who treat it as a legal abstraction.

Romania's state defence base is institutionally layered. Romarm's 15 subsidiaries each carry their own commercial teams, supplier-qualification processes and decision rhythms. IAR is 65% Ministry of Economy; Aerostar is publicly listed but carries government-designated status as the F-16 MLU centre; Romaero is under AAAS restructuring. An overseas supplier engaging a Romarm subsidiary on one programme does not automatically have an entry point at another: the playbook is programme-by-programme and entity-by-entity. Suppliers who treat Romarm as a single counterparty tend to wait a long time for the answer they hoped for on day one.

Senior officials at MApN, ARCTIS and the major primes speak English fluently; technical teams often do as well. Procurement documentation, offset negotiation and subsidiary-level engineering conversations typically run in Romanian. Documentation-only interactions work in English; relationship-depth interactions generally do not. Overseas suppliers who win sustained Romanian business invest in Romanian-speaking business development or Bucharest-based local representation.

Romania's A&D industrial geography is not Bucharest-centric. The Brașov-Ghimbav cluster (Airbus Aerostructures, Airbus Helicopters, IAR, Pirochim, Rheinmetall Victoria) is the densest concentration. Bacău sits in Moldova region, five hours from Bucharest by road. Cugir is in Transylvania. Craiova is in southern Romania. Damen is on the Danube at Galați. Suppliers who try to run Romanian business from Bucharest alone miss the industrial anchors; serious engagement means travel patterns that recognise Romania as a geographically large country rather than a single-city market.

Trade Shows

BSDA is Central and Eastern Europe's flagship biennial A&D exhibition, hosted at the Romaero complex at Bucharest-Băneasa. The 2026 edition is the 10th, marking 20 years since the show's launch. Approximately 312 exhibitors and 28,000 visitors are expected, with major delegations from NATO and Black Sea partner states (BSDA 2026). For overseas suppliers targeting Romanian land systems, munitions, helicopter or aerostructures workshare, BSDA is the single most productive week in the Romanian A&D calendar, running every two years in mid-May at the Romaero venue.

Romanian defence delegations also attend IDEX Abu Dhabi and IDEF Istanbul at scale, and Romanian primes exhibit at Paris Air Show and Eurosatory. None of those are Romanian events; overseas suppliers targeting Romania should plan on BSDA plus one of the large European shows in the same year where Romanian delegations travel.

Romania's Ministry of National Defence (Ministerul Apărării Naționale, MApN) is reachable through mapn.ro; the Department for Armaments (Departamentul pentru Armamente) sits within it. ARCTIS, the Romanian Agency for Technological and Industrial Cooperation for Security and Defence, under the Ministry of Economy, operates the GEO 124/2023 offset regime and is the single most important regulatory body an overseas supplier will interact with on market entry.

With Rheinmetall, we are bringing to Romania one of the most advanced production lines of its kind in the world. This joint venture is a milestone for Romania's defence industry and for Europe's ammunition resilience.

How Westworld helps

Westworld has worked the Romanian aerospace and defence market across the Brașov-Ghimbav industrial concentration, the Aerostar Bacău regional MRO anchor, and the Bucharest-Petrești-Victoria procurement corridor.

Our team operates across programme-office engagement at IAR Brașov and Airbus Aerostructures Romania, through industrial-cooperation work under GEO 124/2023 and ARCTIS, and on Tier-2 and Tier-3 supplier introductions into Aerostar, UMB, Romaero and the incoming Hanwha and Rheinmetall Victoria greenfields.

Read more about our sales representation services, our European aerospace coverage, our European defence coverage or our country-by-country coverage map.

If you are weighing Romanian market entry or looking to deepen existing Romanian activity, please get in touch.