This year, we can only hear about the appearance of new military equipment. Since the beginning of 2025, the Ministry of Defense has codified 600 different types of weapons. Of these, 250 are drone models and another 100 are ammunition. This is twice as much as last year.
Defense officials often boast about the growth in the number of drone manufacturing companies - now this figure has already exceeded 500. But this does not always mean the development of the defense industry, technologies, and better provision of the front.
Ukraine has built a large defense market and in competition has given birth to many innovative solutions that have played an important role on the front. But the times have come when the strategy of maximum diversity in the arms market began to play against us.
A multitude of different drones, components, different characteristics, and various accompanying equipment overload logistics, slow down training, and delay the moment of a drone's combat flight. And the supply of different ammunition for drones with different equipment rules can generally lead to injuries to soldiers.
The lack of unification also hinders the development of technologies and the market. It is more difficult for software developers to develop high-quality solutions without a single standard of hardware. It is difficult for component manufacturers to develop the production of components without having standard component characteristics. It is difficult for engineers to integrate military equipment that differs in design and characteristics from unit to unit into a single combat system.
And fragmented ordering of the same products between dozens of different companies prevents you from gaining economies of scale and accumulating resources to invest in truly complex technological projects and keep your product competitive on the front lines.
And this is not to mention the corruption risks that arise as a result of the chaos in the procurement of a "zoo" of various weapons.
Defense agencies and the General Staff have been racking their brains for months now over how to set standards for new military equipment and at least partially bring the arms market out of anarchy. But the task is not easy, because at the same time it is necessary to maintain the flexibility of constantly changing technologies.
What's the problem?
Previously, it was believed that the diversity of Ukrainian military equipment was rather our advantage. The opening of the drone market to all interested parties in 2023 made it possible to find effective young companies that, competing with each other, invented extraordinary solutions.
But there is another side of the coin – a large market has given rise to a "zoo". Many different drone models are entering the front, each of which has its own components, software, and features of use. The inability to stop at one of them takes away two main resources from the military: money and time.
Defenders have to spend a lot of time and money on mastering the use of new types of drones and equipping them for their needs in front-line workshops.
A good example of a unified drone is the Chinese Mavic. Software has been developed for it and units are being supplied with original components, which allows them to be used stably and even come up with various homemade modifications.
For example, the so-called "sparks" are dual original batteries for longer use of the drone in the air. The presence of a large number of original spare parts allows for mass production of such modifications with Chinese "Mavics" without the risk of getting into a defect.
At the same time, some Ukrainian drones can sometimes lie in the unit's warehouse for months due to the lack of necessary spare parts.
In the FPV drone segment, the problem of lack of unification and clear standardization is felt perhaps the most. Some of the hundreds of models have many cheap and untested solutions. One of the military told "Oborontsi" that he repeatedly encountered battery fires that could not be extinguished in the field. As a result, the military lost property, and sometimes entire dugouts burned down.
A separate story is with the ammunition for these drones. After the liberalization of ammunition production, many new manufacturers appeared, but at the front, the large number of different products causes discomfort.
"Ten companies have made "knuckleheads" (munition initiation systems) with their own threads. And another ten companies have made blanks with their own threads. And I can't take their fuses and put them on the ammunition I need, because they all have different threads. I have to order them from a turner at a Kharkiv enterprise to regrind for me."
"My dream, as a commander, is for each vehicle to have a unified ammunition that will be understandable for a serviceman to use," said Yuriy Fedorenko, commander of the 429th separate regiment of unmanned systems "Achilles" at the Defense Tech Era forum.
Unification and standardization are also needed for electronic warfare equipment, of which there are also dozens of different models on the market.
"Units use a large number of tactical and operational-level electronic warfare equipment developed by different manufacturers. This creates difficulties with operation, compatibility, maintenance and personnel training. The lack of clear unified requirements for form factors, power types, mounts, control interfaces, antennas and connectors complicates the integration of such equipment into a single electronic warfare system. Often, the power supplies, cables or antennas of one system do not fit another, even within the same unit.
"Take, for example, the color indication of the status of systems. Many pieces of equipment use different or contradictory signaling schemes (green, red, blue), which can mislead personnel. And NATO standards clearly define the logic: green - regular operation, red - critical error or failure, yellow - warning or unstable mode, blue - special or encrypted modes. Using this scheme allows the military to navigate the state of the system without unnecessary training, even in stressful conditions ," Anatoly Khrapchinsky, deputy director of Piranha tech, told Defense.
The lack of unified standards also hinders technological development. In an article about machine vision, Defense wrote that the large amount of different hardware prevents programmers from developing a single, effective and mass-produced auto-targeting system for FPV drones.
And Taras Tymochko, a consultant for Come Back Alive, said in an interview with Defense that the fragmentation of development companies prevents the development of an automated system for shooting down Russian drones with interceptor drones.
"Automated shooting down systems exist, but they are in a disassembled state. That is, there is a separate automatic launch system, a separate approach to the target, and a separate destruction system (...) The problem is that these different "segments" belong to different companies. If all this were combined into one mechanism, and if all these engineers worked together, it seems to me that we would have had a drone with automatic launch and automatic destruction of the target a long time ago," Tymochko noted.
Another disadvantage of the "zoo" is the parallel work of companies on similar products. On the one hand, this promotes competition and development, but on the other hand, it wastes resources on R&D, which requires ever-increasing investments.
"In Russia, there is one manufacturer of deep strikes, and we have several. There are pros and cons to this story. And, in my opinion, there are too many cons. We developed because there were many production teams. But now it is already hindering us," Oleg Boldyrev, a veteran of the Russian-Ukrainian war, who is involved in the system of long-range drone production, told UP in an interview.
After all, the lack of clear technical requirements for weapons creates corruption risks in procurement. As Tetyana Nikolayenko, a representative of the Public Anti-Corruption Council under the Ministry of Defense, told Oboronka, now the Joint Stock Company "orders" FPV drones from the supplier not according to technical parameters, but according to specific names that are listed in the list from the General Staff. This kills competition and gives manufacturers a reason to dictate their price. In addition, the lack of uniform technical requirements prevents transparent tenders, which would allow significant savings in budget money. Currently, contracting is carried out only under direct agreements.
The main thing is not to harm
The issue of unification and the formation of technical requirements has long been on the agenda of defense officials. But the problem is not as simple as it seems at first glance. And "simple solutions" can simply do harm.
This does not mean that unification should be abandoned. It seems that the Ukrainian defense industry is now at the stage where it is necessary for further development. But the process must be carried out consistently, flexibly, and competently.
For example, if the requirements for FPV drones are set too strictly, in the style of Soviet GOSTs, it can kill the development of technologies, because manufacturers will lose space for creativity.
According to Nikolayenko, the constant change in technological trends at the front requires flexibility from FPV drone manufacturers and customers. If there is no flexibility in forming standards, then at one point the state will start supplying hundreds of thousands of technologically irrelevant drones to the front.
Another issue is competition. If instead of ten suppliers, there is only one, then the manufacturer may lose the incentive to develop the product. One combat commander told Oborontsi that he is not so much concerned about the lack of unification as about the loss of momentum in the development of the technology of one of the key drones used by the unit.
Ultimately, will the standards for a particular weapon be written competently and independently enough?
"I see people who don't know how to build anything telling engineers what to build. I'm afraid when these respected decision-makers start to standardize something."
I will give just one example. During the ATO/JFO, the Armed Forces developed technical requirements for an army SUV. And it said "central tire inflation". And that's it - any global manufacturer does not meet the requirements of the Institute of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The army did not purchase cars," Oleg Boldyrev said in an interview with the Ukrainian News Agency.
The trend towards unification is a departure from the philosophy of maximum saturation of the market with companies and various solutions. And the main thing here is not to kill the innovative environment that was created as a result of deregulation.
"If there is a bias towards unification, for a manufacturer who is committed to scaling, it will even be good. Production chains will be shortened, production efficiency will increase. However, this is the way to the fact that the search for innovative solutions will slow down.
(...) It is possible to balance. It all depends on the creativity and openness of our official. Do not make crazy restrictions that will slow down the development of the industry, but on the other hand do not allow for an even greater variety of connectors and everything that falls under unification. This is possible to achieve. Our user, that is, the military serviceman, must participate in the unification process. He is the one who knows best how it should be," said Yaroslav Honchar, the head of the Aerorozvidka NGO, in a conversation with Ukrainian Radio.
Unification with Ukrainian specifics
As Deputy Defense Minister Valery Churkin told DOU in an interview, the department has already developed standards for ammunition and explosives. The official believes that out of more than 200 samples of ammunition for drones, about 20 should remain in the Defense Forces.
The agency plans to implement a similar program with UAVs. Ideally, from about 600 drone models, there should be a few dozen unmanned aerial vehicles for various purposes. Then, according to Churkin, the state will be able to scale them up as much as possible.
The official says that the plan is to complete work on standards for FPV drones, long-range strike drones, and their combat units in July-August.
Requirements for UAV modularity are also being developed, i.e. the ability to put different components on one platform for specific combat missions. To begin with, antennas, control panels, and cameras should become modular to simplify the logistics of unmanned units.
According to Nikolayenko, the development of relevant standards for drones has been ongoing for over a year, and they expect the new head of the Unmanned Systems Forces Command to accelerate this process.
Regarding the reduction in the number of manufacturers of the same type of products, there is a certain corruption risk that the market will not be divided among the "right" manufacturers. Therefore, the Brave1 technocluster believes that the unification of manufacturing companies should occur by itself, without manual state intervention. But this requires transparent rules.
For example, in large government tenders, only large manufacturers will be able to offer a lower price for drones. And small companies will be able to hold their own either by creating a unique solution that competitors will not have, or by uniting with several other small teams around a single project.
A step towards such unification was the opening of Brave1 Market. This is a new marketplace for the military, which presents drones, electronic warfare, electronic warfare equipment and their components. In total, the marketplace already has about 1,500 products.
Project coordinator Yulia Myrna told Defense that in the marketplace, military personnel will rate each product and leave detailed comments about its problems and advantages. They will be able to compare products with each other and choose the best ones.
And it is the market, according to the Brave1 team, that will allow us to determine the best technologies for the front, which will contribute to their scaling and, therefore, unification.
The military will spend military unit funds on Brave1Market, which means it will only be a small part of the purchases. However, to spend money from the Ministry of Defense budget, the Defense Procurement Agency is developing a similar marketplace – Dot chain defense, where the military will also have a catalog of various products and see reviews from colleagues.
To summarize, Ukraine's path to unification of weapons does not follow the Russian scenario - when the state manually selects a contractor and scales up the production of a dozen key models that it considers the most effective or has a corrupt interest.
The Russian model of unification also works, but the enemy manages to achieve results thanks to its large resources. Brave1 believes that competing with Russia for resources is the wrong way to go, because the enemy has much more money.
Instead, we need to look for an asymmetric response and build a different system that allows for room for creativity and at the same time ensures concentration of orders for scaling and increasing production efficiency.
And the sooner Ukraine finds this golden mean, the sooner the defense industry will acquire a "mature" structure and move towards sustainable development.