Aerospace Daily & Defense Report

UK defense ministers will not say when a decision might be made on whether to contract for a £1 billion new fleet of medium helicopters.

A series of recent demonstrations have familiarized Boeing F/A-18E/F and Lockheed Martin F-35C pilots with Collaborative Combat Aircraft.

The UK’s chief of defense staff says he is unable provide a date for the publication of the Defense Investment Plan.

MaiaSpace, an ArianeGroup subsidiary developing a small, reusable launcher, has plans for a larger version with twice the payload, CEO Yohann Leroy said.

Israel has rarely shied away from defense industrial challenges, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s pledge to wean the country off U.S. military financing support sets the bar at a new level.

Sweden is planning to invest a further $1.6 billion in air defense capability focused on protecting cities and civilian infrastructure.

China’s CAS Space says it has completed the first suborbital test flight of its Li Hong-1 reentry capsule, containing microgravity experiments.

China conducted the first flight of a domestically developed 3D-printed turbojet engine in November 2025.

Sweden is joining the list of European countries buying Iceye synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellites.

India suffered a third-stage failure on its Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) rocket on Jan. 12, leading to the loss of 15 satellites and a reentry capsule.

Eutelsat says it will buy another tranche of satellites from Airbus to build out its OneWeb low-Earth-orbit broadband communication system.

Dassault Aviation says it has invested $200 million in the Series B funding round of French artificial intelligence startup Harmattan AI.

The UK says its effort to rapidly develop a conventional ballistic missile under the recently launched Project Nightfall is aimed at arming Ukraine.

Norinco subsidiary Aisheng Technology Group has carried out the first flight of the Tian Ma TM-1000 large cargo UAS on Jan. 11.

Europe should establish a European Security Council to bolster its defense posture, Defense and Space Commissioner Andrius Kubilius argues.

Conferences and events for professionals in the aerospace and defense community.

Conferences and events for professionals in the aerospace and defense community.

For more information about Aviation Week Intelligence Network’s (AWIN) 2025 Military Fleet & MRO Forecast and other Aviation Week data products, please see: https://pgs.aviationweek.com/forecast

News in brief.

URSA MAJOR joins TELEDYNE BROWN’s D31 team... M1 Support Services gets Fort Rucker aviation maintenance contract... LEONARDO DRS promotes new COO...

The holy grail of the first all-solid-state battery in a production vehicle for delivery to customers is being claimed by small Finnish company Donut Lab.

As part of the SpaceX Crew-11 astronauts’ upcoming early departure from the ISS, command of the orbital outpost will be turned over to a Russian cosmonaut.

The U.S. Space Force has awarded military space launches worth $739 million to SpaceX to support future missions for the Space Development Agency and NRO.

The U.S. Navy awarded GE Aerospace a $1.4 billion contract for five lots of T408 engines to power the CH-53K heavy-lift helicopter for the Marine Corps.

The U.S. Air Force’s training command is set to start flying and maintaining the Boeing T-7A Red Hawk as it builds the initial, small fleet.