Armaments company: Tank manufacturer KNDS cancels IPO

The German-French arms company KNDS is not going public for the time being. Given the current market fluctuations, IPO The company said it would only be continued when better market conditions returned. The Financial Times had previously reported that the owners were having problems convincing investors of the planned valuation of more than 12 billion euros.

The shares of the manufacturer of the Leopard 2 main battle tank and the 2000 self-propelled howitzer were to be placed on the stock exchanges in Frankfurt and Paris as part of a double listing, as the company announced at the end of June. It could have been one of the largest European defense IPOs in recent years.

Defense industry under pressure on the stock market

Recently, however, the environment for defense stocks on the stock market has deteriorated. The shares of competitor Rheinmetall lost a lot of value. “KNDS and its shareholders will continue to closely monitor capital market conditions and are prepared to resume the IPO as soon as market conditions permit,” the company said.

This was preceded by an agreement between the German and French governments on the future ownership structure of the company. The Federal Republic of Germany and the French state will each acquire a 40 percent stake in KNDS. The remaining 20 percent should be sold to institutional investors as part of the IPO.

KNDS was created in 2015 through the merger of Krauss-Maffei Wegmann and the French company Nexter. KNDS is currently owned by the German family behind Krauss-Maffei Wegmann and the French state. The group employs a good 11,000 people and achieved sales of 4.4 billion euros in the 2025 financial year. The headquarters is in Amsterdam and the German headquarters are in Munich.

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