Thales is leading the SEACURE project, a major European defence initiative that aims to enhance the continent’s capabilities in Anti-Submarine and Seabed Warfare.
The project, launched in November 2024, involves 35 partners from 13 EU member states and is part of the European Defence Fund (EDF). SEACURE builds upon the previous EDIDP SEANICE project and focuses on developing autonomous systems to safeguard critical maritime infrastructure.
The programme, which will run for 45 months, aims to demonstrate a fully integrated system designed for autonomous Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) and Seabed Warfare operations.
The system will utilise a combination of air, surface, and underwater drones to detect, classify, identify, and track underwater threats in challenging environments.
The goal is to increase operational autonomy through a modular and scalable architecture, which is also designed to be interoperable with other systems for collaborative combat.
As tensions rise in various regions, including the Middle East and the Far East, the SEACURE programme aims to strengthen Europe’s ability to protect maritime infrastructure, such as offshore wind farms, from potential threats. The project also seeks to ensure that European nations have the tools needed to secure their waters against both state and non-state adversaries.
SEACURE is a continuation of the EDIDP SEANICE research initiative, which concluded in 2023. The project aims to provide a new approach to protecting critical maritime infrastructure, ensuring the ability to operate freely in European waters.
Partners involved in SEACURE include:
- Thales DMS France SAS
- Alseamar
- Atlas Elektronik GmbH
- CEIIA – Centro de Engenharia e Desenvolvimento (Associação)
- Drass Galeazzi Srl
- Thales Edisoft Portugal S.A.
- ESG Elektroniksystem- und Logistik GmbH
- Etme Peppas & Associates Société Anonyme
- Exail Robotics
- Fincantieri S.p.A.
- Kongsberg Discovery AS
- Leonardo – Società per Azioni
- Naval Group
- Saab Kockums Aktiebolag
- Ffi – Forsvarets Forskningsinstitutt (FFI)
- Patria Aviation Oy
This looks like a clear French stitch up in revenge for AUKUS. Well if that’s the case it isn’t very smart for obvious reasons. Is what it does mean is we are going to need to find Atlantic Centric and Auz Centric partners to defend our space with duplicate equipment. We cant leave the Cables and infrastructure unguarded.
The US should be worried about their backyard as should Europe, meaning ours. As usual RoI is very likely missing in action.
Alternatively we could either just join the project or buy the product if it is good.
And your evidence of this being a “clear French stitch-up”??
If Dassault had been leading this then alarm bells would be ringing. Even still, with 13 countries and 35 companies being involved, Thales has far less chance of hijacking it than Dassault had of hijacking the Eurofighter programme.
Most of the time when these sorts of projects are coordinated mostly by Germany, Italy or France are usually the coordinators of EU-funded defence projects mostly.
So Thales isn’t allowed any contracts anymore since Aukus? Or is this the famous british inferiority complex i keep hearing about?
Since this includes Norwegian, Swedish and Finnish partners, there should be no shortage of worked example data from their governments after the recent anchor antics in the Baltic.
Whilst Patria is best known for IFVs and Aviation is less relevant to sub-sea, you’d have to expect they have existing relationships with their main customer Finnish MoD.
Apparently the Finnish Coastguard are leading on the anchor dragging investigation, which keeps the initial response civil, not military, consistent with hybrid war.