BDT UK’s Project Grayburn pitch to re-arm British industry

Project Grayburn is a litmus test for how the British Army balances combat effectiveness with sovereign industrial capability.

With over 170,000 rifles, optics, support equipment, and a 30-plus-year support horizon on the table, it is arguably the Army’s most strategically significant small-arms procurement since the SA80 entered service.

BDT UK, the British arm of Beretta Holding Group, is one of several contenders in the running, alongside Heckler & Koch, SIG Sauer, Knight’s Armament, and others. But its bid is distinctive. It offers not only two mature rifle platforms and a NATO-standard optics suite, but also a concrete, phased plan to stand up a full-spectrum manufacturing capability in the UK.

As part of that vision, BDT has proposed establishing what it calls a “Small Arms Hub” at its existing 405-hectare Skydock test facility in Lincolnshire. The site, already partially leased by BDT’s subsidiary Centanex, includes a 210-metre underground ballistic range originally built to test aircraft armaments during the Second World War.

Senior representatives from BDT, Sako and Steiner Optics, outlined the proposal at an event in North London on 17 July.

The company confirmed that an agreement is already in place with the landowner to allow for expansion should its bid be selected. A new production hall of over 2,500 square metres is planned and, if built, would support skilled employment in the local area. A BDT spokesperson indicated that if a formal agreement with the Ministry of Defence were secured by 2030, deliveries of the full requirement – estimated at around 170,000 rifles – would conclude by 2042.

BDT’s proposal to the MoD includes four tiers of UK content: 5%, 20%, 80%, and 100%. The 20% model would include domestic production of key receiver components and local assembly and testing. The 80% configuration would bring almost all manufacturing onshore, except for barrels. At 100%, full UK-based production would include cold-hammer-forged barrels.

Jack Cadman, Law Enforcement and Military Group Manager at BDT UK, told me and other journalists, “There’s a spectrum of what can be done. These aren’t discrete options — 5%, 20%, 80%, or 100% UK-made. What we’re saying is: here’s what that could look like tactically. At 5%, all the components are manufactured at home sites — Beretta in Italy, Sako in Finland, Steiner in Germany — but assembly, testing, and evaluation take place in the UK. That’s not our preference. Assembly factories are out of fashion — and rightly so.

But as a first step, given the timelines, it might be necessary. 20% means UK partners would make the upper and lower receiver and forend. At 80%, only the barrel is made overseas. Now the barrel is the key point — and I think UK budgets are coming around to this — producing the barrel in the UK is the critical component in a time of need. We’re in a fortunate position — we’re not a distributor or a partial assembler. Because of the companies Beretta has acquired, we can offer a complete system. We’ve had discussions about laser modules, bayonets, grenade launchers — we can provide all of them. But it comes down to money, timelines, and the demand signal from the UK. Project Grayburn is the crocodile closest to the canoe, but we’re also thinking ahead.”

The consortium laid out its case at a combined media briefing and live-fire demonstration, attended by UK Defence Journal. The event featured technical walk-throughs of both rifle systems, hands-on testing with Steiner optics, and an industrial strategy presentation that was as detailed as it was blunt. The message was consistent: the weapons are proven, the production model has been validated overseas, and the UK could build them here, if it moves now, said Cadman.

“We’ve broken it down into four phases. So essentially, contract is awarded on January 1st — let’s say 2027, that’s just an arbitrary figure I pulled from the sky. In that first year, we’re doing technology transfer and initial delivery — getting the factory site in the UK, doing the prerequisite work. That’s what we call complete knockdown, or CKD assembly — your 5% UK-made.

The weapon gets delivered to the UK completely apart, we put it together over here, and then we test and evaluate. The reason that’s important is because we are training people from scratch to build weapons in the UK — they need to go through the process. Phase three, months 24 to 72, is where the equipment setup happens — CAD machines, cold hammer forging — and by Month 72 we need a full UK domestic production.”

On localisation, Beretta’s model, and UK testing capacity, Cadman was very clear.

“From a localisation perspective, our history is essentially the blueprint for us. From a BDT UK perspective, it was the M9 contract in the US — that’s where Beretta USA built a factory and provided the service pistol to the US military for over two decades. More recently, we’ve had the Sako contracts. We’ve expanded the portfolio significantly — from precision rifles to going back to self-loading rifles for Finnish and Swedish defence. And then in Qatar, we did a joint venture with Barzan Holdings — that’s the Qatari Government’s procurement company.

We created a company called Findeq, providing rifles and pistols to the Qatari forces. The similarities to the UK are striking. We already have a production facility in St Neots — they produce distraction devices, not rifles, but that would be the basis for our domestic production facility. The bottleneck isn’t production — it’s testing and evaluation. That site has a 200-metre and 150-metre indoor range used during World War Two to test RAF ammunition. We’re in a very forward position there, and we’ve already made plans around how the facility would look.”

Attendees were invited to fire both rifles. As someone with no live-fire experience, as you can see clearly in the image above, I found the weapons remarkably easy to handle. Recoil was light, the controls intuitive, and hits were immediate. “There’s next to no recoil,” one instructor said as he handed over a magazine. “You’ll be hitting everything.”

The two offerings cover a broad operational spectrum. First, the Beretta NARP (New Assault Rifle Platform), chambered in 5.56×45mm NATO, is a piston-driven, AR-style rifle developed for the Italian Army. “Externally, it’s an AR-15,” said Marco, Beretta’s international sales lead. “But internally, everything is new. We use a short-stroke gas piston, no buffer tube, and it’s fully ambidextrous. That means folding or adjustable stocks, depending on the mission.”

Second, the Sako M23 family, based on the AK24 programme currently being delivered to Sweden and Finland. Sako representative Cameron described the platform as modular, suppressor-ready, and built for cold-weather reliability. “We’ve got multiple barrel lengths: 11.5-inch CQB, 14.5-inch general-purpose, 16-inch infantry, and a 7.62 designated marksman rifle,” he explained. “The Swedes are already getting these – we’re producing today.”

Steiner provided the optics: the M8Xi 1–8× low-power variable optic (LPVO) and the T1Xi red dot sight. “These are fielded with NATO units already,” said a representative from Steiner. “The M8Xi gives you a dual-focal plane setup – a mil-spec DMR reticle in the first plane, and a red dot CQB reticle in the second. You get both long-range precision and fast acquisition in one optic.”

Beretta Holding has a track record in export industrialisation. In Qatar, it entered a joint venture with Barzan Holdings (Bindig) to produce the ARX160 under license. In the US, Beretta built an entire plant in Maryland to deliver over 600,000 M9 pistols to the US military.

“In Qatar, we entered a joint venture with Barzan Holdings. We brought in machinery, trained a workforce, and delivered rifles from a greenfield site. It’s not a hypothetical we’ve done it before. Nobody is going to do this speculatively. But we have a site, we have a plan, and we’re ready to move the moment the green light is given.”

The Sako M23 has already been selected by Finland and Sweden as a joint-service rifle platform in 5.56 and 7.62. These NATO-standard calibres are available off the shelf, but Beretta and Sako say they are prepared to develop new variants should the MoD choose to shift to 6.8 mm or other emerging rounds.

The BDT offering goes beyond the rifles themselves. Steiner provides both day optics and electro-optics, with future upgrades likely to include laser aiming devices and digital sights via its U.S. sister company, EOTech.

The event ended with a sense of cautious momentum. The consortium is ready. The rifles are mature. The optics are fielded. The facility is identified. But investment depends on clarity from government.

“At the very heart of it, we want to deliver a new individual weapon system that meets the needs of soldiers — not just now, but into the future. We know we’ll probably face a calibre change at some point, and we’re preparing for that. We’ve already developed a 6.5 Grendel survival platform, and we’ve got 7.62 for the Sako weapon system. What we don’t want is another situation like Bowman — where private-sector technology moves faster than the contract and the UK ends up with something obsolete. So we’ve planned for that. We’re building an organic production activity that doesn’t rely solely on UK-funded contracts. We want to export.

We want to be able to feed the beast — self-sustain, and let the UK tap into that when needed. It’s not just final-phase manufacturing either — it’s supply chain resilience, going deeper than that. We’re already using UK suppliers for component parts and materials. We’ve learned from major platform programmes that struggled. We’re actively planning for how we upscale if we go to war tomorrow. That’s the kind of resilience we’re offering.”

BDT UK is offering Britain a way back into full-spectrum small-arms production. Whether that offer is taken up now, or passes into the realm of “what might have been”, may define the Army’s next 30 years of soldier systems and the fate of the UK’s place as a sovereign arms producer. If Project Grayburn is a litmus test, BDT UK has delivered its sample. What remains to be seen is whether the MoD recognises the opportunity, and the urgency, before it evaporates.