Study AI if you want to get hired in the defense industry, the CEO of Scandinavia's biggest military manufacturer says
Artificial intelligence and software skills will be a young graduate's best bets for a job in the rapidly surging defense industry, said Micael Johansson, CEO of Saab.
"I think there will be a big change going forward," Johansson told Business Insider on the sidelines of this year's Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore.
"Our systems will be software-defined, so of course, AI engineers, great software skills, data engineers will be super important to us," said the CEO, who was elected president of the Aerospace, Security and Defence Industries Association of Europe last month.
Johansson said defense primes like Saab, which manufactures the Gripen fighter aircraft, will still need technicians and mechanics to build weapons platforms.
"We need excellent, skillful production people as well. Finding welders to do submarine work is not an easy thing, so it's a mix of jobs," he said.
But he added that Saab and the larger industry are moving toward a live service business model that emphasizes software in weapons systems that can be incrementally updated and connected with other platforms.
Part of that industry push comes from observing the war in Ukraine, where both sides are developing new techniques in drone jamming and countermeasures in a matter of weeks.
"The technology will grow so quickly, so you cannot buy a sort of, 50,000 drones and put them in stock. You want to have almost like drones as a service," Johansson said.
Saab, the Nordics' biggest defense manufacturer, has enjoyed an industry-wide boom since the start of the Ukraine war. The Swedish firm reported 2024 annual sales of 63.75 billion Swedish krona, or about $6.6 billion. By comparison, annual revenue in 2021 was 39.15 billion krona.
Amid the uncertainty of Washington's long-term role in NATO, the firm's share price has surged by more than 120% since President Donald Trump's inauguration in January to 484.30 krona, as of Monday afternoon.
Johansson said Saab has been investing heavily to meet demand and has grown its workforce from 19,000 to 25,000 in the last two years.
"We've had more than 200,000 applicants last year for the company and 74,000 for this first quarter," he said.
The CEO had said in February that he expected the Stockholm-based firm to hire 1,000 more people in Sweden this year. On Friday, he told BI he'd revised the figure to 2,000 after realizing Saab had already hired 900 new staff in the first quarter.
"Probably will be wrong again," he said.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Boston Globe
an hour ago
- Boston Globe
Lebanon aims to lure back wealthy Gulf tourists to jumpstart its war-torn economy
Now, after last year's bruising war with Israel, Hezbollah is much weaker and Lebanon's new political leaders sense an opportunity to revitalize the economy once again with help from wealthy neighbors. They aim to disarm Hezbollah and rekindle ties with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries, which in recent years have prohibited their citizens from visiting Lebanon or importing its products. Advertisement 'Tourism is a big catalyst, and so it's very important that the bans get lifted,' said Laura Khazen Lahoud, the country's tourism minister. On the highway leading to the Beirut airport, once-ubiquitous banners touting Hezbollah's leadership have been replaced with commercial billboards and posters that read 'a new era for Lebanon.' In the center of Beirut, and especially in neighborhoods that hope to attract tourists, political posters are coming down, and police and army patrols are on the rise. Advertisement There are signs of thawing relations with some Gulf neighbors. The United Arab Emirates and Kuwait have lifted yearslong travel bans. All eyes are now on Saudi Arabia, a regional political and economic powerhouse, to see if it will follow suit, according to Lahoud and other Lebanese officials. A key sticking point is security, these officials say. Although a ceasefire with Israel has been in place since November, near-daily airstrikes have continued in southern and eastern Lebanon, where Hezbollah over the years had built its political base and powerful military arsenal. As vital as tourism is — it accounted for almost 20% of Lebanon's economy before it tanked in 2019 — the country's leaders say it is just one piece of a larger puzzle they are trying to put back together. Lebanon's agricultural and industrial sectors are in shambles, suffering a major blow in 2021, when Saudi Arabia banned their exports after accusing Hezbollah of smuggling drugs into Riyadh. Years of economic dysfunction have left the country's once-thriving middle class in a state of desperation. The World Bank says poverty nearly tripled in Lebanon over the past decade, affecting close to half its population of nearly 6 million. To make matters worse, inflation is soaring, with the Lebanese pound losing 90% of its value, and many families lost their savings when banks collapsed. Tourism is seen by Lebanon's leaders as the best way to kickstart the reconciliation needed with Gulf countries -- and only then can they move on to exports and other economic growth opportunities. Advertisement 'It's the thing that makes most sense, because that's all Lebanon can sell now,' said Sami Zoughaib, research manager at The Policy Initiative, a Beirut-based think tank. With summer still weeks away, flights to Lebanon are already packed with expats and locals from countries that overturned their travel bans, and hotels say bookings have been brisk. At the event hosted last month by the tourism ministry, the owner of the St. Georges Hotel, Fady El-Khoury, beamed. The hotel, owned by his father in its heyday, has acutely felt Lebanon's ups and downs over the decades, closing and reopening multiple times because of wars. 'I have a feeling that the country is coming back after 50 years,' he said. On a recent weekend, as people crammed the beaches of the northern city of Batroun, and jet skis whizzed along the Mediterranean, local business people sounded optimistic that the country was on the right path. 'We are happy, and everyone here is happy,' said Jad Nasr, co-owner of a private beach club. 'After years of being boycotted by the Arabs and our brothers in the Gulf, we expect this year for us to always be full.' Still, tourism is not a panacea for Lebanon's economy, which for decades has suffered from rampant corruption and waste. Lebanon has been in talks with the International Monetary Fund for years over a recovery plan that would include billions in loans and require the country to combat corruption, restructure its banks, and bring improvements to a range of public services, including electricity and water. Without those and other reforms, Lebanon's wealthy neighbors will lack confidence to invest there, experts said. A tourism boom alone would serve as a 'morphine shot that would only temporarily ease the pain' rather than stop the deepening poverty in Lebanon, Zoughaib said. Advertisement The tourism minister, Lahoud, agreed, saying a long-term process has only just begun. 'But we're talking about subjects we never talked about before,' she said. 'And I think the whole country has realized that war doesn't serve anyone, and that we really need our economy to be back and flourish again.'
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Gaza rescuers say Israel fire kills 36, six of them near aid centre
Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli forces killed at least 36 Palestinians on Saturday, six of them in a shooting near a US-backed aid distribution centre. The Israeli military told AFP that troops had fired "warning shots" at individuals that it said were "advancing in a way that endangered the troops". The shooting deaths were the latest reported near the aid centre run by the Gaza Humanitarian Fund (GHF) in the southern district of Rafah and came after it resumed distributions following a brief suspension in the wake of similar deaths earlier this week. Meanwhile, an aid boat with 12 activists on board, including Swedish climate campaigner Greta Thunberg, was nearing Gaza in a bid to highlight the plight of Palestinians in the face of an Israeli blockade that has only been partially eased. Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that at around 7:00 am (0400 GMT), "six people were killed and several others wounded by the forces of the Israeli occupation near the Al-Alam roundabout", where they had gathered to seek humanitarian aid from the distribution centre around a kilometre (a little over half a mile) away. Palestinians have congregated at the roundabout almost daily since late May. AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls compiled by the civil defence agency or the circumstances of the deaths it reports. Samir Abu Hadid, who was there early Saturday, told AFP that thousands of people had gathered near the roundabout. "As soon as some people tried to advance towards the aid centre, the Israeli occupation forces opened fire from armoured vehicles stationed near the centre, firing into the air and then at civilians," Abu Hadid said. - Activist boat nears Gaza - The GHF, officially a private effort with opaque funding, began operations in late May as Israel partially eased a more than two-month-long aid blockade on the territory. UN agencies and major aid groups have declined to work with it, citing concerns it serves Israeli military goals. On Saturday, the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said that the overall toll for the Gaza war had reached 54,772, the majority civilians. The UN considers these figures reliable. The war was sparked by Hamas's October 2023 attack on Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official figures. Israel has come under increasing international criticism over the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza, where the UN warned in May that the entire population was at risk of famine. The aid boat Madleen, organised by an international activist coalition, was sailing towards Gaza on Saturday, aiming to breach Israel's naval blockade and deliver aid to the territory, organisers said. "We are now sailing off the Egyptian coast," German human rights activist Yasemin Acar told AFP. "We are all good," she added. In a statement from London, the International Committee for Breaking the Siege of Gaza -- a member organisation of the flotilla coalition -- said the ship had entered Egyptian waters. The group said it remains in contact with international legal and human rights bodies and warned that any interception would constitute "a blatant violation of international humanitarian law". The Palestinian territory was under Israeli naval blockade even before Hamas's October 2023 attack and the Israeli military has made clear it intends to enforce it. "For this case as well, we are prepared," army spokesman Brigadier General Effie Defrin said on Tuesday. - Body of Thai hostage recovered - "We have gained experience in recent years, and we will act accordingly." A 2010 commando raid on the Turkish ship Mavi Marmara, which was part of a similar attempt to breach Israel's naval blockade, left 10 civilians dead. The Israeli military has stepped up its operations in Gaza in recent weeks in what it says is a renewed push to defeat Hamas, whose October 2023 attack sparked the war. On Saturday, the military issued evacuation orders for neighbourhoods in northern Gaza, saying they had been used for rocket attacks. Separately, in a special operation in the Rafah area on Friday, Israeli forces retrieved the body of Thai hostage Nattapong Pinta, Defence Minister Israel Katz said. "Nattapong came to Israel from Thailand to work in agriculture, out of a desire to build a better future for himself and his family," Katz said. He was "brutally murdered in captivity by the terrorist organisation Mujahideen Brigades", the minister charged. The Mujahideen Brigades is an armed group close to Hamas ally Islamic Jihad that Israel has also accused over other deaths of hostages seized from Kibbutz Nir Oz near the border. The military said Nattapong's family and Thai officials had been notified of the operation. Thai Foreign Ministry spokesman Nikorndej Balankura said the country was "deeply saddened" by his death. During the October 2023 attack, militants abducted 251 hostages, 55 of whom remain in Gaza, including 31 the Israeli military says are dead. bur-kir/dcp/ysm
Indianapolis Star
2 hours ago
- Indianapolis Star
See Purdue's 50-year plan to transform downtown Indianapolis campus with high-rises
Over the next 50 years, Purdue University plans to transform its downtown Indianapolis campus into an urban hub with high-rise buildings serving up to 15,000 students, according to a new master plan. Today, Purdue's 28-acre sliver of land wedged between Indiana Avenue and Michigan Street on downtown's west side — roughly the same acreage as the parcel on which Lucas Oil Stadium and its south parking lot sit — is home to three parking garages and five expansive parking lots. A conceptual master plan approved by Purdue's Board of Trustees June 6 envisions 16 new buildings on that site, featuring 4.5 million square feet and about 3,500 student beds. With leasing agreements at nearby apartments, Purdue expects to offer students more than 5,300 beds downtown. The plan foresees an increase in Purdue's student enrollment in Indianapolis from about 2,800 in fall 2024 to 15,000 by fall 2075. Despite the dense development, the plan sets aside about 60% of the downtown acreage for open spaces where students can gather and walk, according to Maryland-based architecture firm Ayers Saint Gross, which designed the 50-year master plan. Construction on the campus' main building, the 15-story Academic Success Building near the intersection of West and Michigan streets, began this April. The $187 million facility with classrooms, lab space, dining halls and student housing will be complete around May 2027. The long-term plan comes as Purdue and Indiana University in Indianapolis jostle for position on the west side of downtown following the 2024 split of the two schools' joint urban campus, IUPUI. As Purdue updates its plans, IU has allotted hundreds of millions of dollars to build multiple major facilities, including an 11-story School of Medicine building and a 4,500-seat athletics center, on its downtown campus in the next few years. IUPUI split: Indiana Ave. fell as IUPUI rose. After Purdue and IU split, can they help renew the Avenue? After the IUPUI division, IU retains most of the 536-acre downtown campus and enrolled more than 25,000 students in fall 2024. IU also owns the 28-acre wedge of land where Purdue will expand between Indiana Avenue to the north, Michigan Street to the south and Blake Street to the west. Purdue has signed a 100-year lease to use the property. Purdue is expanding into Indiana's capital city in part to ease the strain on housing and other facilities at the West Lafayette campus, which now enrolls an all-time high of more than 55,000 students. University leaders have also announced partnerships with Indianapolis-based science and engineering firms like animal health company Elanco and race car manufacturer Dallara. 'Rather than a single hub, Purdue is weaving into the fabric of the city's innovation and industry corridors," David Umulis, Purdue's senior vice provost for Indianapolis, said in a statement, "expanding from downtown all the way to the northwest side of Indianapolis."
