History

Since their foundation, VDL companies have been working on supplying military end-users. The growth and development of our group of companies provided the motivation for forming a central cluster at the beginning of 2000. The purpose of this cluster is to represent all VDL group companies in the military market. On the basis of our classical role as supplier we started by supplying steel armour and other components, as well as sub-assemblies that were welded together, separated or assembled at VDL in accordance with specific standards.

On the basis of its role, VDL Defence Technologies was nominated key supplier by various reputable OEMs in the military and security industry.

In this dynamic environment and with the acquired experience, VDL Defence Technologies has the vision as system integrator to evolve from classic ‘Tier-2’ to ‘Tier-1’ supplier. Next to expertise in production (technologies), this creates an impulse towards conceptual design, validation and after-sales (ILS).

VDL Defence Technologies becomes a separate business unit with the operation based at VDL Bus Chassis BV.

Having carried out a number of exciting projects for the Dutch Defence industry (Fire Brigade ASK/ISK, EODD and BSB Kmar), the transformation was completed in mid-2014 when the first medium-sized project was won for the Dutch Marine Corps on Curaçao, with the delivery of 33 logistics trucks. In late 2018, the 12KN Air Assault project was added to the portfolio, which involved the production of around 515 army vehicles for the Dutch Defence forces in collaboration with Mercedes.

The future lies in broadening the portfolio in the Netherlands and abroad and applying knowledge, products and technologies from the civil world.