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Satellites, uncrewed vehicles and protecting undersea cables are key areas of interest for Finland in Australian defence industry, according to Finnish ambassador Arto Haapea.
Speaking exclusively to Defence Connect, ambassador Haapea said the Nordic country’s relationship with Australia is of particular importance and expanded upon the possibilities from a joint statement signed between the two nations earlier this month.
“That’s something that we have been working towards for a good couple of years, bringing the Finnish defence and dual-use industry to Australia, to different defence events around Australia, to showcase what the Finnish industry has to offer,” he said.
“If you imagine where we are geographically in the world, you can also imagine that our defence industry has to be pretty strong. So, we have about 300 to 400 defence companies in Finland, many of which are topnotch in global comparisons, and they are very interested in the Australian market.
“So, there is a sort of big demand for us to work together in the defence space, and that’s I think where the ministers sort of took it from, that we need to really sit down and see where we can bring added value to one another, where we can work together.
“Similarly, there is very much interesting development and innovation happening in the Australian defence industry as we speak, so that’s something that the Finnish side will be looking at very carefully.”
Asked about specific investments Australia’s defence industry could see from Finland, the ambassador pointed to Finnish synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellite company ICEYE, which has the largest SAR fleet in the world, as an example.
“They are very much interested in not just the Australian market, but they are very much interested in working with Australia, possibly even manufacturing in Australia, to sort of really bring forward the scale of the Australian economy and what that could mean for a Finnish company,” he said.
“Drone technology is [another area] where Australia has been developing very fast. Unmanned vehicles, different kinds of unmanned vehicles, be it underwater vehicles or others, are definitely there when it comes to interesting technologies.
“I understand there’s a lot happening also in protecting our underwater infrastructure cables and the rest, and those kinds of companies are certainly of interest since we have very vulnerable underwater infrastructure in the Baltic Sea around Finland.
“We’ve been having some incidents in the past years where that cable infrastructure has been attacked by foreign vessels, so there’s a lot that we can work on together.”
Ukraine is another area where Australia and Finland can work closely together, said ambassador Haapea, with the Finnish defence and economic affairs ministers stressing to their Australian counterparts “how important it is that Australia is committed to supporting Ukraine”.
“It’s not just the sort of actual support that they give, which is very important, but it’s also a signal. It’s a signal to our adversaries and countries that are supporting Russia in its illegal attack on Ukraine that we will work together,” he said.
“We are tireless in our efforts to defend Ukraine, and we will work as long as it takes to get there, so that’s definitely a key area, and I know that our armed forces are also working together, for example, in training Ukrainian soldiers.”
Australian Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Richard Marles met last week with Finland Minister of Defence Antti Häkkänen to sign the joint statement affirming defence cooperation, accelerating defence capability partnership, supporting Ukraine and advancing defence industry cooperation.
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