- 1 week ago
- #aerospace
- #defense
- #aviation
- #space
From AI-powered drone wingmen and Boeing’s next-gen Navy fighter to Europe’s space race, new airliners, and a booming helicopter market—this roundup is packed with bold moves and future tech. Catch the highlights and see which stories take off!
#Aerospace #Defense #Aviation #Space
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0:00 - Combat Drone Developments
1:53 - Civil Aviation, Engines, and Fuel Costs
4:35 - European Satellites and Launchers
6:21 - International Fighter Jet Developments
9:30 - Boeing Wins Navy Fighter Contract
10:19 - Electric Aircraft and Helicopter Markets
We are now available on Spotify! Listen now https://open.spotify.com/show/6KW2Zo9GU39VZSvv2zIpxM
#Aerospace #Defense #Aviation #Space
Subscribe to our channel for more aerospace updates.
Comment below and tell us what you liked most!
👉 This channel was created in collaboration with https://www.youtube.com/@xaviertytelman
0:00 - Combat Drone Developments
1:53 - Civil Aviation, Engines, and Fuel Costs
4:35 - European Satellites and Launchers
6:21 - International Fighter Jet Developments
9:30 - Boeing Wins Navy Fighter Contract
10:19 - Electric Aircraft and Helicopter Markets
We are now available on Spotify! Listen now https://open.spotify.com/show/6KW2Zo9GU39VZSvv2zIpxM
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NewsTranscript
00:00Hello and welcome to this new press review.
00:02Which aerospace and defense articles did you like best?
00:05This week, starting with the US Navy, which awarded the contract for its 6th generation
00:10fighter to Boeing, Freighter, the German start-up ISA Aerospace, which achieved a double first
00:16with its Spectrum launcher and the South Korean Air Force, which received its first KF-21
00:21Boromay fighter jet.
00:22But first, let's start with some French news.
00:24Combat drones are going to arrive much faster than expected.
00:27France has just announced that cooperative flights between rafale jets and combat drones
00:31will begin as early as 2028 as part of the Hyperion project, especially for experimenting with
00:37artificial intelligence in aerial combat.
00:39And some hints from a few friends make me think that it might be Mirage 2000 jets which
00:42are already being modified and used as testbeds for artificial intelligence.
00:46And this will allow us to further develop the concept so that we have an already operational
00:50system when the successor to Néron becomes operational by 2035.
00:54On the other side of the Atlantic, there's also a lot happening in this field, with the
00:59US Air Force wanting at least 500 autonomous drone fighters by 2032.
01:03And they now have names with the FQ-42A Vengeance, which was produced by General Atomics, and the
01:09FQ-44A Fury from the company Anduril.
01:12And the budget requested by the military for these projects already reaches $2.37 billion for
01:17the year 2027.
01:18Knowing that the first one, Vengeance, has already been delivered for testing, while the Fury has
01:22already carried out flights, in cooperation with F-35s.
01:25We'll finish with military drones with General Atomics, which is offering a Super Reaper at
01:30around $10 million, capable of covering more than 8,000 nautical miles, that's almost 15,000
01:35kilometers.
01:36It's called the Wildfire, and it's meant to replace the MQ-9A in the Mast Modular Aircraft
01:41program.
01:42And its goal is to be able to deliver two long-range anti-ship missiles.
01:46And if the proposed performance-to-price ratio becomes a reality, it would really be spectacular
01:51value for money.
01:52Before moving on to the fighters, let's take a quick look at the civilian sector, especially
01:56with Airbus, which is innovating once again, with the first flight of its Airbus A350F
02:01on September 29 in Toulouse.
02:03It was a flight lasting 4 hours and 10 minutes.
02:06And the 350, that's the cargo version of Airbus's long-haul aircraft, the A350.
02:10And you should know that it already has an order book of 115 orders.
02:13Which is huge in a market that used to be Boeing's exclusive domain, since Boeing represents
02:1894% of the world's large cargo aircraft fleet.
02:21And now there are 400 hours of testing planned for the A350F before it starts to erode Boeing's
02:27near monopoly.
02:28Up until now in the sector.
02:30We're staying with Airbus with the delivery of the first single-isle, very long-range
02:35A320XLR equipped with the new version of the Pratt Whitney GTF Advantage engine.
02:40And it was delivered to United Airlines, the GTF engine.
02:43Its special feature is that it has a geared turbofan, which means the fan can spin more
02:48slowly than the turbine.
02:50And that allows for a 20% improvement in efficiency compared to the previous generation engine.
02:55And this new version of the engine allows for an increase in thrust by 4% at takeoff at
03:00sea level and even 8% at altitude compared to the standard GTF.
03:05This will allow for new fuel savings, while the most sensitive parts of the engine will
03:08have almost double the durability, which will naturally reduce its maintenance costs.
03:12And for your technical curiosity, well, you should know that when it comes to the open
03:16rotor engines developed by General Electric and Safran, they didn't choose the same
03:20technique at all, since for them, their efficiency isn't related to mechanical gears.
03:24And they've put all their faith in material science thanks to revolutionary fan blades
03:29made of 3D woven carbon and thanks to the engine core, which uses ceramic matrix composites
03:34that allow for higher combustion temperatures, as well as industrializing the combustion chamber
03:39using metal 3D printing, which makes it possible to achieve shapes that traditional methods
03:43cannot produce.
03:44And we can hope that these two methods will eventually combine to gain a few more percentage
03:48points of operational efficiency.
03:50And let me remind you, the A320neo family and the Boeing 737 MAX were around 2 liters per
03:56100 km per Pascal-Senger transported.
03:59So these are results that are already very interesting, but it's not enough, because right now there's
04:04a surge in the price, which is caused by the American attacks on Iran and could trigger a wave of
04:08airline bankruptcies.
04:09So now fuel can account for up to 45% of a company's costs instead of the traditional
04:1425 to 30%.
04:15So we should see many airlines disappear, like Spirit Airlines in the USA, which is actually
04:19one of the biggest low-cost airlines in the United States.
04:23And in Europe, we can mention AirBaltic, which has filed for Chapter 11 protection, or even
04:29Volotea, which announced a debt restructuring to avoid bankruptcy due to 150 million euros in
04:34additional fuel costs.
04:35Now we're changing altitude and heading into space.
04:37And for once, it's Europe that's making headlines with two major events.
04:40First, there's the surprise concerning the Iris Carrey constellation, which is supposed
04:43to complete the UTELSAT constellation, one web, in order to provide satellite internet
04:48connections following the Starlink model.
04:50But under European control, and above all, it will be able to offer secure communication
04:54capabilities to states and European armed forces.
04:57And the big surprise is that the Belgian startup Aerospace Lab won the 2.4 billion euro contract,
05:02and is now becoming a heavyweight in the space sector.
05:05To deliver, 264 of the 330 low-orbit satellites in this first batch of the constellation, and
05:12the last 66 must be delivered directly by Airbus.
05:15And as for its part, Therese Alenia will provide a secure payload for the 330 satellites.
05:20And in addition to this low-orbit layer, which is at 1,200 km altitude, there will also be
05:2518 MEO satellites at 800 km altitude.
05:28The first launches are scheduled for 2029, and Aerospace Labs Gigafactory in Charleroi will
05:34be able to produce up to 500 satellites per year.
05:36And to ensure continuity, the one web network will also deploy 669 satellites of the current
05:43generation, so that they can remain in orbit until 2034.
05:47The second news is in the field of launchers, and it's with the German startup EISA Aerospace,
05:53which is achieving a double first.
05:56First, it's the first private European commercial launch company to reach orbit and deploy payloads.
06:00And on top of that, it's the first time this achievement has been accomplished from continental
06:04Europe.
06:05Since the launch took place in Norway, whereas until now, launches had been happening from
06:09French Guiana.
06:11And so, we should also point out that their Spectrum launcher completed its mission on
06:15just its second flight, so we potentially have a third launcher.
06:18To ensure the deployment of the IRIS carry constellation, afterwards, of course, the Ariane
06:23and Vega rockets were happily returning to fighter jets.
06:26A lot of news this month, starting with South Korea, which has just received its first
06:30production KF-21, so let me remind you about the KF-21.
06:33Boramai was introduced as a 4.5 generation fighter, like the Rafale, the Eurofighter,
06:38or the Grepen.
06:39And the aircraft is entering the South Korean Air Force, 25 years after the program was launched,
06:44with currently only air-to-air capabilities.
06:45And the integration of internal weapons bays, which was supposed to provide some stealth features,
06:49has been postponed to a later version.
06:51But the main problem is that the development is underfunded, because they have to make up for
06:55Indonesia's reduced involvement, as Indonesia had initially taken a significant share of the program.
06:59And the most difficult part would be convincing others to go beyond the 100 units expected in the
07:03South Korean Air Force at the beginning of the 2030s.
07:06Because in that case, they have to win export contracts against the Grepen, Rafale, and the F-16,
07:10knowing that nearly a third of the aircraft is actually imported, especially from the United States.
07:15This automatically excludes a number of countries that want to remain ITAR-free.
07:20And South Korea still has the ambition to achieve a form of sovereignty,
07:23but that would only be at the end of the decade 2030.
07:26We're coming back to Europe, especially with Dassault, which has received a request for 24 additional
07:31Rafales from Egypt.
07:32So the contract hasn't been signed yet, but a formal request for a technical and commercial
07:36offer has been made.
07:37And this will allow Egypt to reach 78 Rafales following the first 54 aircraft
07:41that were delivered up until 2021.
07:44But what's most interesting is that this information comes right after this Sino-Egyptian exercise,
07:49Eagle of Civilization 2026, in which Chinese J-16s were notably involved.
07:54And while Beijing is carrying out a very strong commercial offensive in the Egyptian market,
07:58this further strengthens the Egypt-Greece-UAE axis, all three equipped with Rafales, to stand their ground.
08:03Especially against Turkey, which also has some news,
08:06since the country has signed a contract for 20 Eurofighter Typhoons for 8 billion pounds
08:11with the British company BAE.
08:13The first two Turkish pilots have just started their training in the United Kingdom,
08:17and the first deliveries of the new aircraft by BAE Systems are scheduled for 2030.
08:21So we have to remember that this is still a default choice for Turkey.
08:24First, because they were excluded from the F-35 program.
08:26After buying the S-400 air defense systems from Russia,
08:29they also failed to develop their national aircraft, which was supposed to be operational in 2023.
08:35And now today we know that it will actually be around the mid-2030s.
08:39Turkey also failed to join the South Korean KF-21 project.
08:42The evaluations of Russian fighter jets, especially the Sukhoi 35, turned out to be absolutely disastrous.
08:48The Rafale was simply off-limits to them, because France recognizes the Armenian genocide,
08:53and so there is tension with the Turks.
08:55And the only option left for them was to buy the Eurofighter,
08:59even though it's obviously a plane that isn't in high demand internationally.
09:02And by the way, this is the first export contract for the Eurofighter since 2017,
09:06which now makes a total of 84 exports in 15 years for the aircraft.
09:10Which is obviously a disastrous record compared to the Rafale and its 323 export orders over the same period,
09:17not even counting the 114 future Rafale sales to India.
09:21And obviously knowing that the Eurofighter benefits from the diplomatic power of 4 countries,
09:26compared to France, which is alone in the field of 6th generation aircraft.
09:29The big news comes from the United States, since Boeing has won the contract worth more
09:33than 20 billion dollars for the future carrier-based fighter of the US Navy,
09:37which is currently called the F-FAXX.
09:39So Boeing is getting the full development of both of the US military's future aircraft,
09:43and will find itself in an almost monopoly position,
09:45since the US Air Force had already selected Boeing for the NGAD, which is now called the F-47,
09:50and is obviously a setback for Lockheed, even though their difficulties with the F-35 left
09:55little room for launching any additional projects.
09:57While Boeing has surpassed Northrop Grumman in terms of industrial capabilities,
10:01the latter is already committed to the B-21 Red Raider bomber.
10:04So it's a winning bet for Boeing, which had invested heavily with its own funds,
10:09and had directly set up an industrial complex in St. Louis,
10:12even before knowing if they had won the contract,
10:15which now allows them to offer a timeline that none of their competitors could match.
10:19But back to the civilian sector with more news about Earth,
10:22Airtel Aerospace, which I introduced to you in the previous press review,
10:25since they managed to fly the largest electric plane in history.
10:28Well, they're moving very fast, since they've already received a commitment from GSX
10:32to buy 100 of their future 36-seat hybrid electric plane, which is called the ES-ES36,
10:38and it will be able to make trips of 200 kilometers fully electric,
10:42and up to 1,200 kilometers in hybrid mode.
10:45With a targeted entry into service in 2031, basically,
10:48GSX is signing for 50 orders and 50 options,
10:51and so Airtel Aerospace is joining the very exclusive club of electric aircraft manufacturers,
10:55who have received firm orders.
10:57Alongside, notably, the French company ARA Aero,
11:00which received orders in April 2026 for its 19-seat ARA,
11:03so in a slightly smaller size category,
11:06we wrap up this international overview with the helicopter market,
11:09and a study indicating that the global helicopter market will continue to grow.
11:12Since no less than 7640 new machines will need to be delivered for the civil market by 2035,
11:19representing a market worth 56 billion dollars, 53 of these helicopters will replace existing aircraft,
11:25while the rest will help increase the size of the global fleet.
11:28And in terms of distribution, Airbus would capture 47% of the delivery value.
11:33Leonardo 29 and Bell 16.
11:35And to this very important number, we have to add the military market,
11:39which also represents 6,000 aircraft over the next 10 years,
11:43that makes a total of nearly 13,000 helicopters to be delivered.
11:47And to that, we can still add the 11,000 order commitments for our VTOLs,
11:51which are also called electric air taxis.
11:53So there will be a lot of people in the air.
11:55And for that, I also refer you to the video I made with the air traffic control centers of the
11:59future,
12:00by Partal S in Toulouse, in the comments of the video.
12:03If you want to know a little more, I hope you enjoyed this press review.
12:06That was the summary for the month of September.
12:08We'll meet again at the beginning of November to see everything that's happening now.