The French aerospace group reported first-half revenue of €6.9 billion in its Equipment & Defense division, an organic increase of 14%. Growth was 12.4% when excluding the transfer of Safran Ventilation Systems from the Aircraft Interiors business.
“Defense activities made a solid contribution as well, especially in inertial navigation systems, which recorded strong double-digit growth along with robust performance in electronics and the HAMMER guided bomb,” Chief Financial Officer Pascal Bantegnie said.
Bantegnie highlighted the weapon’s performance during Safran’s second-quarter earnings call. The company did not provide separate figures for HAMMER orders, production or deliveries.
Recurring operating income in Equipment & Defense rose by 26% to €955 million in the first half. The division’s margin increased by 1.1 percentage points to 13.8%.
Defence operations were a clear contributor to that improvement, according to Bantegnie. Higher earnings from Safran’s nacelle business also supported the result.
“Defense is clearly a good contributor to the margin improvement,” Bantegnie said. He did not disclose the respective contributions from HAMMER and Safran’s other defence activities.
Chief Executive Officer Olivier Andriès said the broader defence market continued to show particularly strong momentum. Safran is investing in additional capacity to meet demand and support further expansion.
The investments include Hemispheric Resonator Gyroscope inertial-navigation technology in Montluçon. Safran is also expanding positioning, navigation and timing capabilities in Germany, along with electronics and surveillance systems in Dijon.
More than 80% of the company’s defence-electronics backlog comes from international customers, Andriès said. Safran is targeting a book-to-bill ratio of at least 1.3 for the business in 2026 after recording 1.6 in 2025.
Management said the targeted order intake was needed to support annual defence-electronics revenue growth of 20% or more through 2030. The company did not issue a separate growth forecast for HAMMER or identify the markets behind the weapon’s first-half performance.
