The City Council met: Covenant and Falk Defence will not remain the only defence companies in Leipzig + Video

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Leipzig must be an attractive location for defence contractors. Or perhaps it is simply one of many places in Saxony that are suddenly becoming of interest because Europe is rearming. Following Covenant, the defence contractor Falk Defence is now making a name for itself, having sought and found a site in Leipzig. And this despite the fact that Leipzig’s economic policy does not want an arms cluster at all, as Clemens Schülke, the councillor responsible for economic affairs, emphasized at the council meeting on 28 October. The Left Party group had tabled an urgent question. It isn’t urgent at all, at least according to FDP city councillor Sven Morlok.

The fact that, following in the footsteps of the American company Covenant, a firm called Falk Defence had also been looking for a base in Leipzig to develop precision weapons – and perhaps eventually manufacture them here too – had been known since March. The company itself had announced this on its website and on its LinkedIn account. So there was simply no urgency.

Which, of course, isn’t quite true. After all, it was only reported by some media outlets a few days ago. A post on some company website is, after all, not public news. And the Left Party’s scepticism was entirely justified. Is a Leipzig-based arms industry gradually being established behind the scenes, without even the city council being informed?

“Several corroborating media reports from yesterday, Sunday, and today, Monday, have brought to light the establishment of the defence firm Falk Defence – a manufacturer of ‘precision-guided missiles’ – in Leipzig,” the Left Party faction summarised the issue in its parliamentary question.

“It is evident that, for some time now, the defence company has been in contact with Leipzig City Council (in particular the Department of Economic Affairs), as well as with the Saxony Economic Development Agency (WFS) and the Central German Institute for the Security Industry (MISI), with a view to establishing the company here.”

Confidential enquiries

So can such plans for a new business location simply fly under the radar for a whole year? This was the question posed by Dr Volker Külow, a city councillor for The Left, at the council meeting on 28 October. After all, it was not only the Left Party faction that saw sufficient grounds here for the question to be treated as urgent. Even though it had already been discussed in the Economic Affairs Committee. But even there, it had only been included on the agenda because the Left Party faction had tabled the urgent question. This was also confirmed by Clemens Schülke, the councillor responsible for economic affairs.

But the Left Party’s questions went even further: if matters concerning Covenant and Falk Defence had already been dealt with behind closed doors for so long, what other surprising news might the city council expect – which defence company might be looking for a cosy spot here in Leipzig?

And what role do the Saxony Economic Development Agency (WFS) and the Central German Institute for the Security Industry (MISI) actually play in this – the latter having been set up specifically to attract defence industry companies to the Central German region?

Clemens Schülke did not dodge the questions on 28 October either, but hinted at how such relocations are initiated entirely behind closed doors, how companies in the defence sector sound out Invest Region Leipzig (IRL) to sound out whether there are potential sites in and around Leipzig for setting up their businesses, and that these enquiries are treated as confidential until the relocation is actually finalised.

And indeed, the establishment of Falk Defence also had a long lead-up. According to reports, an initial enquiry was made as early as 7 November 2025, followed by a meeting on 27 November at the Central German Institute for the Security Industry (MISI). Although no suitable plot of land was found through the city,

However, Falk Defence subsequently found a suitable site itself and was able to rent an office and a workshop to begin developing a prototype. A production site in the Leipzig area is still being sought, Schülke confirmed. Nevertheless, he would not disclose any information about the current location.

17 enquiries, five commitments

He also did not shy away from the follow-up question from the Left Party: “Which defence companies or suppliers are the city or the IRL currently still in contact with, with a view to attracting them to Leipzig as well, and is the administration planning to create a ‘defence cluster’ to compensate for the loss of industrial jobs?”

Although Schülke did not name any names, he made it clear that it is not just individual defence companies that are enquiring in Leipzig – mostly via Invest Region – as to whether a site can be found here for their highly specialised production. According to Schülke, there have already been 17 such enquiries. Of these, 12 were enquiries regarding the production of defence products – essentially what might be described as military equipment.

Although he did not specify exactly which goods were involved, a further five enquiries related to dual-use products – that is, products in demand in both the civilian sector and the defence industry.

Not all 17 enquiries will result in a company setting up operations here. According to Schülke, this has so far been confirmed for only five companies. Seven companies have since withdrawn their enquiries, either because they did not find what they were looking for or because they may have found better conditions elsewhere. Talks with four companies have been broken off.

When only the defence industry is making enquiries

It is, however, somewhat contradictory for Leipzig to emphasise that it does not actually want a defence cluster on its doorstep, yet still respond positively to relocation enquiries from various companies. However, such enquiries will not be rejected out of hand, according to Schülke. As with Covenant, the same applies to Falk Defence: they will not be working with explosives on site.

On the other hand, Schülke emphasised that it is currently almost exclusively the defence industry that is still looking for available sites in Saxony at all. The economic downturn has been making itself felt in relocation policy for some time now. And – according to Schülke – for Leipzig, the establishment of defence companies would mean around 700 jobs.

But what about the carefully maintained secrecy or – as Volker Külow put it – the ‘stealth mode’ practised for a year? Schülke did not see it that way. Falk Defence’s plans have been public knowledge since March. But only through channels that are, in their own way, rather specialised. And the unspoken criticism from the Left Party is actually all too understandable: why is such a business location only brought up in the Economic Committee once the media have reported on it and the Left Party has tabled an urgent question?

In that context, the question about ‘stealth mode’ was by no means out of place.