Securing Australia’s sovereign edge: how Thales’ trusted land capabilities and technologies protect, connect and sustain the Australian Defence Force

A nation shaped by distance, disruption and duty, Australia’s geography results in a unique security equation. The nation sits at the crossroads of the Indo‑Pacific, a region that is more connected, more contested and more consequential than at any point in recent memory. Supply chains weave across oceans. Digital networks thread through homes, hospitals and bases. The Australian Defence Force (ADF), alongside defence industry, must be able to protect the nation, support regional stability, and help communities recover—often at the same time.

Demands arrive as technology accelerates. Autonomy pushes decision‑making to the edge. Artificial intelligence compresses time. Satellites stitch data from orbit to operators on the ground. In this environment, capability is not only about performance—it is about trust. The design, the support and ultimately the control. 

That is the promise of sovereign capability: critical technologies developed, produced and sustained in-country, with Australian expertise and industry at the core. Sovereignty is not isolation. It is interdependence on Australia’s terms—open to partners, aligned with standards, resilient to disruption, and ready when the nation needs it most.

From challenge to capability: mapping needs to outcomes

Australia’s land domain’s needs are straightforward: keep people safe; move the ADF farther and faster; ensure they can see, decide and act with confidence; train and sustain them smartly; and ensure the industrial backbone is ready to deliver when it counts. Through five connected capabilities that link technology to outcomes, Thales in Australia’s land domain is a key part of the ADF, and the nations, security posture.

Protected mobility: vehicles designed to protect lives and enable missions

Modern operations—combat, peacekeeping, border security, disaster response—need vehicles that protect crews, carry critical payloads, plug into digital networks and operate across extremes. This is the role of protected mobility vehicles: purpose‑built platforms engineered for survivability, mobility and versatility, designed and built in Australia.

The Bushmaster, a combat‑proven protected mobility vehicle, has transported soldiers, evacuated civilians and carried vital supplies in varied, contested and challenging environments. Its mine and blast protection have saved lives. Its design supports medical and logistics variants, making it as relevant to humanitarian relief as to high‑risk patrols. 

Proven Performance

1200+ Bushmasters in-service with 9 Defence Forces, supported globally.

Bushmaster has been successfully deployed by defence forces in a number of regions including the Middle East, Africa, the Pacific and Europe.

On-going design enhancements, a wide variety of user selectable mission equipment and mature global through life support have ensured that Bushmaster continues to meet evolving customer requirements.

The Hawkei, a lighter protected mobility vehicle, brings similar protection in a more agile footprint. It is air‑portable, adaptable to communications and command roles, and designed to move quickly where larger platforms cannot. Together, the vehicles offer a spectrum of mobility and protection options for commanders and civil authorities alike.

What matters most is the design philosophy: intentional survivability; modularity to adapt; open architectures to integrate; and a production system that anchors jobs, skills and supply chains in Australia. Vehicles  built locally are maintained and upgraded by Australians, ensuring availability, affordability and faster development when requirements evolve.

Sovereign small arms: precision, reliability and control in every soldier’s hands

Capability is personal at the small‑unit level. The rifle a soldier carries, the precision weapons they rely on, the training systems that build muscle memory—these are the capabilities that translate policy into performance. A sovereign small arms capability ensures the ADF’s frontline is designed for the mission, improved through feedback and sustained at home.

Australia’s small arms heritage, centred in Lithgow NSW, has been trusted by Australian soldiers for over 100 years. Today, that expertise supports the ADF with modern assault rifles, precision weapons and emerging soldier‑system technologies, complemented by training solutions that help units shoot, move and communicate more effectively. The emphasis is on reliability, ergonomics, accuracy and through‑life support—qualities that matter in heat, dust, rain and under pressure.

Sovereignty is practical. There is local authority to adapt to evolving requirements without waiting on distant roadmaps. It means local manufacture and support that keep operational availability high. It means a collaborative pipeline where feedback from soldiers changes the next batch of kit. And it means export‑ready quality that strengthens Australia’s industrial base and reputation abroad.

Guided weapons and explosive ordnance: the backbone of deterrence and readiness

Deterrence rests on credible capability, and credible capability depends on a robust ecosystem for guided weapons and explosive ordnance (GWEO). The Australian Government’s vision for a Sovereign Guided Weapons and Explosive Ordnance Enterprise recognises that industrial capacity—design, manufacture, integration, test, storage, maintenance and disposal—is as strategic as the munitions themselves.

Thales contributes to this enterprise with decades of experience in explosive ordnance and munitions services in Australia. Spanning the safe management of EO across its life cycle; support to Defence at purpose‑built facilities; and partnerships that connect sovereign manufacturing with global best practice. In practical terms, it means Australia can act with agility, control its supply and evolve product lines with safety, compliance and performance at the core.

The value of a sovereign EO base shows up daily: when a training activity relies on assured supply; when a surge in demand can be met without overstretching logistics; when disposal is handled responsibly. It is a system that merges engineering, regulation and stewardship—backed by a workforce whose skills are hard‑won and long‑retained.

Sovereign Guided Weapons Heritage

Explosive ordnance services: safety, stewardship and certainty

Explosive ordnance is unforgiving. The disciplines around it—storage, handling, testing, certification, transportation and disposal—must be meticulous. Australia’s EO services blend technical depth with rigorous process, ensuring compliance with standards and alignment with safety. Thales supports Defence through integrated EO services that combine facility management, quality assurance, test and evaluation and a culture of continuous improvement.

The result is practical certainty. Units get what they need, when they need it, with safety and performance assured. Lifecycle stewardship reduces cost and risk across decades. Knowledge gained on the factory floor and at the range feeds back into design and sustainment, reinforcing the sovereign EO system that underpins national readiness.

Land training and simulation: preparing people for complexity

Capability impacts people—how they think, decide and act together under pressure. Live training is indispensable. But live training alone cannot cover the complexity and frequency modern operations demand. Land training and simulation extend realism, repetition and reach, safely and affordably, by combining live, virtual and constructive environments.

Thales supports the ADF with networked simulation that links vehicles, crews and command posts; reconfigurable systems that mirror in‑service platforms; and immersive trainers that sharpen decision‑making, communication and coordination. Synthetic environments replicate terrain, weather, populations and adversary behaviours, enabling units to rehearse missions and refine tactics before stepping off. Post mission and simulation analysis captures data, turning training into insights that drive improvement over time.

The impact is tangible: more opportunities to replicate critical tasks; better integration across combined arms and joint operations; faster progression for new entrants; and safer, greener training that reduces wear on equipment and cuts travel.

Smart sustainment: availability as a capability

Availability is a capability in its own right. Smart sustainment raises availability by marrying engineering with data: condition‑based maintenance; predictive analytics; digital twins; obsolescence management; and agile supply chains anchored in local industry.

Thales collaborates with Defence to deliver performance‑based sustainment that aligns incentives with outcomes. The focus is on preventing faults rather than reacting to them, shortening turnaround times, and ensuring the right parts are in the right place before they are needed. Digital tools surface patterns, and technicians translate them into action. The net effect is more days of availability, lower through‑life cost and greater confidence for commanders and planners.

Sustainment is also where sovereignty becomes visible to communities. Local depots and workshops create skilled jobs close to where equipment is used. Regional SMEs plug into national programs. Apprentices, veterans and career‑changers build careers in a sector that invests for the long term. Every availability metric has a human story behind it.

Open, secure, sovereign: designing for trust at scale

Land systems today are software‑defined and networked. They need to be secure by design, resilient to cyber threats, and open enough to integrate new capabilities without locking customers into a single path. They must be transparent, so users and regulators can understand how they work, and they must be sovereign, so Australia retains control over critical functions and data.

Thales applies these principles across protected mobility, small arms, EO, simulation and sustainment. Security and safety are engineered in from first principles. Open architectures and standards reduce integration friction and future‑proof investments. Assurance comes through rigorous testing, certification and independent evaluation. And data is handled responsibly, ensuring privacy, safety and mission integrity.

This approach is crucial as AI becomes more prevalent. Artificial intelligence can accelerate decision‑making, but only if guardrails are in place. Human factors, clear objectives, robustness to failure, and traceability are essential—especially in safety‑critical environments. 

From cockpit to control room to factory floor: a systems view

The most effective capabilities work as systems, not just products. A protected mobility vehicle is a platform for sensors, radios, battle management and electronic protection. A small arm is part of a soldier system that includes optics, power, data and training. A munition depends on supply chain assurance and safety cases that live across decades. Simulation draws from real‑world data and feeds lessons back into doctrine and design. Sustainment knits it all together, from engineering to procurement to operations.

Seen this way, the value of a partner is measured by the ability to connect dots—making individual components work evolve together. Thales brings domain experience across land, air, sea, space and cyber, and collaborates with Defence, primes, SMEs and universities to turn that experience into practical integration. 

Sovereignty as participation, not isolation

Sovereignty it is the freedom to choose partners, set standards and scale innovation—while keeping essential control in country. Australia benefits from strong alliances and open markets as well as from local design authority, manufacturing depth, certification know‑how and supply chains that can flex under pressure.

Thales’s model in Australia is built on participation. Co‑design with defence users. Co‑production with Australian industry. Co‑innovation with research institutions and startups. Thales Australia is an indispensable partner to the Australian Government, the nation and to the Indo Pacific.