The US company Leonardo DRS has enjoyed considerable success in the Indonesian market with its vehicle-mounted tactical router/server units and rugged tablets and displays.
The company manufactures Data Distribution Unit – Expendables (DDUx) that integrate voice, data, video and various sensors, as well as MRT104 multifunction rugged tablets and MRD121 multifunction rugged displays. These are used by customers to distribute data and to run battle management systems.
Speaking to Asian Military Review at Indo Defence 2025, held in Jakarta from 11-14 June, William J. Guyan, President, International at Leonardo DRS, explained that such products have been delivered to the Indonesian Army over a five-year period.
With deliveries completed, they have been installed on approximately 400 Indonesian vehicles, including Anoa 6×6 armoured personnel carriers and Komodo 4×4 light tactical vehicles. Both these vehicles are manufactured by PT Pindad.
Indonesia loads its own battle management system software onto its vehicles using the aforementioned hardware devices. The Leonardo DRS devices also integrate sensors such as shot detection systems onto these vehicles, which connect to remote weapon stations that can then cue and slew.
Leonardo DRS has supplied the Driver’s Vision Enhancer (DVE) camera system to Indonesia as well, for integration into locally built vehicles. The US company operates in Indonesia with local partner PT Cipta Teknik Berjaya.
Guyan said, “Internationally, there’s a growing perception of threat that’s driving increased defence spending … What we’re seeing internationally is that nations that my have deferred a requirement, or may have waited for home-grown solutions to a requirement, have an urgency to move forward with some capability that’s proven and can be delivered in the near term.”
He added that, secondarily, the potential to have commonality with what US forces are using, for both interoperability and assured supply, is also a priority for some countries. He said this urgency is arising in Asia too.
This means that regional countries that buy American equipment, such as the Abrams and HIMARS, often contain Leonardo DRS devices. The Australian Army’s new M1A2 SEPv3 Abrams tanks, for example, contain them. In fact, Guyan said his company’s Land Electronics division “is the world’s leading provider of rugged computing and display systems for battle management system applications, approaching 400,000 systems around the world”.
Leonardo DRS also builds the Abrams-based Joint Assault Bridge (JAB), with Australian examples believed to be in transit at the moment.
Leonardo DRS has also supplied hybrid electric drives to South Korea’s navy for its FFX-II and FFX-III frigates. Such systems provide not only improved noise discipline and extended range, but they offer greater power levels, especially for future additions such as directed-energy weapons and artificial intelligence applications.
Guyan also mentioned counter-unmanned aerial systems (C-UAS) as another area of growth. Leonardo DRS provides the Mobile-Low, Slow, Small Unmanned Aircraft Integrated Defeat System (M-LIDS) to the US Army and US Marine Corps, and it is mounted on vehicles such as the JLTV, Stryker and HMMWV.
Leonardo DRS has owned the Israeli company RADA since 2022, and this gives it an advantage when it comes to C-UAS. Guyan described RADA as “the world’s leading provider of C-UAS radars”.
Because Leonardo DRS already provides battle management systems and hardware, it is a natural fit for C-UAS to be integrated too. For example, one RADA radar within an army formation means that threat data can be instantly shared to the entire unit via the battle management system and to give an early warning of approaching UAVs.
by Gordon Arthur, Jakarta
