Normandy Defense Initiative: A Regional Fund to Support Companies in the Sector

Normandy Defense, that is the name of a new regional investment fund launched by the Region. It is exclusively aimed at small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and intermediate-sized enterprises (ETIs) in Normandy linked to the defense sector. The goal is to give them the means to invest, grow, and hire.

Access to financing, the key to success

With around one hundred companies and nearly 12,000 jobs, the defense industry constitutes an important part of Normandy’s industrial fabric. Many SMEs participate in the manufacturing of military equipment, often in the shadow of big companies. “For example, there are companies that manufacture spare parts for aeronautics or armaments, like specific screws for the Rafale plane, electronic cards for radars, or subsystems,” explains Alain Dulac, president of the Normandy Defense fund and manager of the Bayeux-based company Factem, specialized in transmission and communication products. However, these SMEs face a recurring problem: access to financing to grow and increase their production.

Increasing capacities

There are specialized funds in defense, but they generally target very large enterprises, “with investment tickets of 10 or 20 million euros. Our companies, on the other hand, need more modest financing because they are smaller, often in the range of a few hundred thousand euros. It is these needs that the Normandy Defense fund will be able to meet,” promises Hervé Morin, president of the Normandy Region. Currently endowed with around 4.3 million euros and established with the support of partners such as Crédit Agricole and Groupama, Normandy Defense intervenes by entering the capital of companies. “By having more equity, these companies can more easily take on debt, and therefore invest, develop a new production line, and ultimately hire,” emphasizes Hervé Morin.

Normandy is the first region to create such a dedicated fund for defense. It anticipates growing needs in a context of increasing international conflicts, particularly in Ukraine and the Middle East.