1OCT

Denmark orders €13.3m in drone shotguns

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15:21UTC

Denmark's procurement agency cited an acute need to buy anti-drone shotguns and ammunition directly, then ordered more Weibel radars a week later.

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TechnologyAssessed

Key takeaway

Denmark bought anti-drone shotguns without competition and ordered more radars from Weibel a week later.

Denmark's defence procurement agency, Forsvarsministeriets Materiel- og Indkøbsstyrelse (FMI), gave notice on 15 September that it would buy €13.3 million of military anti-drone shotguns, spare parts and matching ammunition from a Danish supplier without competition, citing "an acute need"⁠¹. The filing, number 635288-2026 on TED, is a voluntary ex-ante transparency notice. A buyer publishes one before signing, so that a rival who objects to a direct award has a short window to challenge it.

Shotguns sit at the close end of a counter-drone system. They engage a small drone that has already got past detection and jamming, and they destroy it outright, which the military calls a hard kill.

On 22 September FMI ordered more XENTA-M5 radars from Weibel Scientific, the Danish radar maker, for what Defence Minister Jeppe Bruus called "a proper drone shield"⁠². Neither the value nor the quantity was disclosed. In June Denmark joined eight other countries in signing a US-led letter of intent for a shared counter-drone marketplace, yet both September orders went to Danish firms.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

Small drones can now fly over military bases and attack soldiers. Copenhagen has chosen to build its defences against them in layers. Radar spots a drone far away, and other kit tries to jam it. If a drone still gets close, soldiers need a simple weapon to knock it down. Denmark's defence buying agency, FMI, plans to buy special shotguns and ammunition for this, without inviting other companies to bid, saying the need is urgent. It has also ordered more radars from Weibel Scientific, a Danish maker.

Deep Analysis

Root Causes

The VEAT route (a voluntary ex-ante transparency notice) lets a buyer announce a direct award before signing and open a short window for challenges. It gives FMI legal cover to skip a tender while still telling rival makers what it plans to buy.

The notice also names a weapon whose ammunition is specific to it, described as a semi-automatic shotgun with military modifications. Once the gun is chosen, its ammunition and spares can only come from the same source, which narrows any later competition to one supplier.

What could happen next?

Consequence
Ammunition tied to one shotgun design commits Denmark to a single supplier for resupply over the weapon's service life.
Meaning
Copenhagen's September orders went to Danish firms rather than through the shared marketplace it signed up to in June.

Source Landscape

This story draws on neutral-leaning sources

Primary parallel: Sweden's GUTE II award to Saab (ID:3736) put a Nordic neighbour's counter-drone money into a domestic champion. Denmark's September orders follow the same instinct, keeping both the sensor and the weapon inside national industry.

Counter-parallel: In June Denmark signed a US-led letter of intent for a shared counter-drone marketplace with eight other countries. Both September orders bypassed that shared route, so the marketplace has yet to show it can steer a Danish purchase.

At €13.3m, the shotgun buy covers weapons, spare parts and dedicated ammunition in one package, and the notice gives no split between them. The ammunition line will recur for as long as the guns stay in service.

The Weibel radar order carries no published value or quantity. Of Denmark's two September purchases, only the cheaper end of the kill chain has a public price.

Consensus view: RUSI researchers found that when 100 to 150 drones attack a well-defended site, about ten typically reach the target. On that evidence the last metres of a defence decide the outcome, and a soldier's shotgun is the cheapest layer that can deal with the few that leak through.

Counter-view: Sweden's procurement agency chose a different mechanism, paying Saab 2.6 billion Swedish kronor under GUTE II for one mobile system that joins Giraffe 1X radar, Trackfire weapon stations and electronic warfare. Stockholm bought the layers as one integrated system from a single prime; Copenhagen is buying them piece by piece from separate national firms.

Key tension: Whether radars and shotguns bought months apart from different Danish suppliers can share targets fast enough to act as one shield.

Sources:Tenders Electronic Daily·Nordic Defence Sector

Mentions:Tenders Electronic Daily →Denmark →Trackfire →RUSI →Giraffe 1X →Sweden →GUTE II →Saab →Forsvarsministeriets Materiel- og Indkøbsstyrelse →Weibel Scientific →XENTA-M5 →Jeppe Bruus →

First Reported In

Update #18 · Four EU states skip tenders on drone defence

Tenders Electronic Daily· 1 Oct 2026

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Different Perspectives

Israel Defense Forces (Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir)

The IDF finalised a new Unmanned Systems and Artificial Intelligence Branch on 10 September, with full inauguration expected by early December. Israel is reorganising its forces around drones while Israeli suppliers pass into foreign hands: US-listed Ondas bought the fuze maker GATE on 14 September.

EHang (chairman and chief executive Huazhi Hu)

EHang withdrew its 600 million yuan revenue guidance on 25 August, blaming a more cautious Chinese regulator after industry air incidents. China's leading pilotless-aircraft maker now seeks first approvals in Sri Lanka and Thailand while US tariffs and FCC rules shut Chinese parts out of allied supply chains.

DroneShield

The Australian firm won one of ten Domestic Shield ceilings, $500m, on 29 September, while its FY2027-and-beyond committed revenue stood at A$46m. Its own filing warns investors that the US award may never turn into orders.

Pete Hegseth, US Secretary of War

In a speech at Quantico on 30 September Hegseth announced AUTOWARCOM, a four-star drone command targeted for 1 October 2027 if Congress agrees, and called Drone Dominance and JIATF-401 a good start. He wants one command with its own budget to buy at the scale those two efforts have not reached.

Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA)

A DAPA-chaired committee approved a 2.16 trillion won domestic programme on 15 September for an army vertical take-off reconnaissance drone, running from 2027 to 2036. Seoul is choosing slow domestic development over urgent imports for its divisional surveillance.

Taiwan's Executive Yuan (Cabinet)

After the Legislative Yuan voted 60 to 50 on 27 August for a baseline of NT$40bn a year, in principle, for domestic drones and rejected its special budget, the Cabinet said on 30 August it would expedite funding and indicated it would co-sign the act. Taipei gets a statutory domestic market but loses a ring-fenced multi-year fund.