Leonardo, the Italian defense group that owns 25% of European missile maker MBDA, is demanding a major internal shake-up at the company—arguing that production and decision-making need to move faster if MBDA is going to convert its swelling order book into real revenue.
In blunt comments to La Tribune, Leonardo co-CEO Lorenzo Mariani tied the push directly to MBDA’s ability to scale up under what the company calls its “Déluge” strategy, a concept built around overwhelming an adversary’s defenses with large volumes and a wide mix of missile “vectors,” or delivery systems.
Leonardo’s Lorenzo Mariani sets a $6.5 billion revenue bar
Mariani put a clear target on the table: MBDA needs to reorganize to reach €6 billion (about $6.5 billion) in revenue quickly—or, he warned, it won’t be able to work through its backlog at the pace customers now expect.
“Either MBDA reorganizes to quickly reach revenue of six billion euros, or it will be a failure to rapidly deliver this order book,” Mariani said in the interview with La Tribune. The message is aimed at MBDA’s three shareholders: Airbus, BAE Systems and Leonardo, which holds a 25% stake.
The strain isn’t unique to MBDA. Across Europe’s defense industry, companies are juggling historically full order books while production capacity struggles to keep up. For Leonardo, Mariani signaled that the answer is not just adding factory lines—it’s changing how the organization functions.
A shareholder pushing MBDA while keeping other consolidation options open
Leonardo is not positioning itself as a passive investor. The company is also a key player in the broader consolidation of Europe’s land-armaments sector.
Its tie-up with Germany’s Rheinmetall is already “sealed,” according to the article. But Mariani said Leonardo remains open to restarting talks with KNDS—another major European defense group—seeking what he called a “win-win agreement.”
Taken together, the stance amounts to pressure on MBDA from one side and openness to other industrial combinations from the other. Leonardo appears intent on shaping the next round of restructuring in Europe’s defense sector without boxing itself into a single path.
Europe’s post-2022 missile demand—and rising French budgets—add urgency
Missile demand in Europe has surged since 2022, and defense budgets have risen alongside it. In France, defense spending was €47 billion (about $50.8 billion) in 2024, €50.5 billion (about $54.5 billion) in 2025, and €57.1 billion (about $61.7 billion) in 2026—equal to 2.1% of GDP—according to figures published by Opex360.
That spending trajectory feeds directly into orders for companies like MBDA. Mariani’s argument is that MBDA now has to turn that flow of contracts into booked revenue without delay.
The reorganization he’s calling for is aimed at shortening internal decision cycles and speeding deliveries to customers who, in his view, can no longer afford to wait.
