Construction of a dedicate LEOPARD 2A8 tank assembly and repair plant officially began in the Kaunas Free Economic Zone in Lithuania on October 1st.
The plant, with a planned surface of 13,000 square meters, will assemble and service the future LEOPARD 2A8 tanks of the Lithuanian Armed Forces, as well as other heavy equipment.
The plant is being built on behalf of Lithuania Defence Services, a joint venture company established in 2022 by the German arms companies Rheinmetall and Krauss-Maffei Wegmann. A shares transfer agreement has also been signed at the event: under it, Rheinmetall and KNDS will begin to transfer part of their shares to Lithuania’s state-owned EPSO-G Invest. EPSO-G is due to own 25.1 % of Lithuania Defense Services by the end of the transfer, with KNDS Deutschalnd and Rheinmetall holding 37.45 % respectively.
The new plant is drawing investment in the order of 50 million Euro and will create up to 100 new jobs.
Construction of the structure, for some 29 million euro, has been entrusted to YIT Lietuva, a local construction company, with scheduled completion in November 2027. Production of the LEOPARD 2A8s will begin in earnest after that with plans to roll out the first around the end of 2028.
Lithuania is acquiring 44 LEOPARD 2A8 tanks to equip a Battalion, and the plan calls for local assembly of 38 of them. The plant also stands ready to support additional assembly tasks for other LEOPARD customers in the Baltic region.
In the meanwhile, Lithuanian tank crews are already training on LEOPARD 2 tanks, although only on the previous 2A6. They are embedded into Germany’s Panzerlehrbataillon 93, where they receive basic instruction and then training up to live firings. The first few tank specialists have completed their courses and more are in the pipeline ahead of the establishment of the tank battalion beginning in 2027, with tank deliveries from 2028.
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