With a significant number of serving, reserve, and veteran personnel in our global team, I’m delighted that we have been able to formalise our support for the armed forces community in the UK. We are honoured that Janes has supported the world’s armed forces for more than 120 years and, as we continue to deliver our interconnected foundational defence intelligence, we look forward to many more years working in partnership.

Overall, defence spending is expected to rebound in the near-term as government revenues also increase due to improvements in regional economies. According to Janes analysis, defence budgets will return to pre-pandemic levels by 2024, with procurement expenditure expected to reach 2019 levels by 2022,

With all regions except Europe, AsPAC and Latin America likely to implement real reductions in 2021, total defence spending growth will fall to its lowest rate since 2013 – but we’re not expecting an overall contraction. In fact, the worst of the Covid-19 pandemic’s impact on military funding is likely to fall in 2022, when governments may begin to rein in spending. Even next year’s global spend is forecast to remain in positive growth, driven in large part by strong expansion in Asia, and in the years that follow the growth of defence budget allocations is likely to accelerate once again, pushing our forecast global total up to USD2.23 trillion by 2030.

While the pandemic appears likely to stifle the growth in buying power of regions like the Middle East and further depress Russian funding, the relative decline seen in US budgets as Asia-Pacific accounts for an ever-increasing share of the global total remains the big story in military funding, even in the post-Covid world., In 2010 Asia was responsible for just over 20% of the world’s military funding; by 2028 we’re expecting it to have grown to 35%, overtaking North America as the largest region by value.

I’m delighted to be joining Janes at such a pivotal time in the transformation of its global interconnected data and intelligence offerings. I’m passionate about delivering products and solutions that improve our understanding of the operational environment for defense and intelligence professionals worldwide.

I’m delighted that Ben has joined us to head up our global product strategy and delivery. His unique background in GIS and developing solutions for intelligence professionals worldwide will be vital as we build on our legacy and find new ways to deliver the trusted open-source intelligence and proprietary data that our customers rely on.

I’m delighted to announce the acquisition of GPS from Avascent – it’s a great addition to our portfolio of trusted open-source defence intelligence solutions and allows us to enhance our position as the leading provider of defence market forecasts worldwide. This acquisition comes as we continue to build on the momentum we have created since becoming an independent business and ensures that we will continue to deliver the objective open-source intelligence and analytics that the world of defence and security relies upon.

This deal brings a highly complementary capability into the Janes ecosystem of connected data that our customers trust in their most critical decisions. We’re focused on getting our customers the right data in the right structure to underpin the analytics they need to operate in the modern national security environment.

In Janes, we have found a partner that can take the GPS business to the next level while we continue to focus and invest in our core strategy consulting business. Clients who have come to rely on GPS and its custom features will experience no change in the quality of the product or the responsiveness of the client service. Indeed, clients who have wanted closer integration between GPS and other data resources can now look forward to the prospect of more powerful tools to support their strategy, corporate development, and business development efforts.

China’s 2020 budget was the first major indication that defence spending in Asia might remain relatively unaffected by Covid-19, with a real 6.3% increase in military funding announced. Taking inflation into account, this is the largest increase in China’s defence allocation since 2015.

There are significant unknowns and variables that factor into this sort of analysis, but we’re offering a transparent methodology that enables new calculations around the size of North Korea’s stockpile. For that reason, we can’t definitively conclude that North Korea has X or Y amount of nuclear weapons, but we do arrive at a specific range of figures if all of North Korea’s HEU were committed to thermonuclear weapons.

“I’m passionate about delivering business-aligned people leadership that supports and empowers company culture and am looking forward to working with the global team that delivers Janes connected data and intelligence.”

"Adam’s unique experience in change management for complex organisations makes him the perfect fit for Janes as we continue our transformation into the global intelligence provider. Our people are our most important asset, and I’m delighted that Adam has joined us to develop and execute our talent strategy globally.”

“The United Kingdom, France and Germany account for up to 50% of overall European spending on defence. Given the economic impact of the Covid-19 crisis on overall budgets, they are likely to implement cuts to their military expenditure in the near term, bringing down the overall European average. The effect will be relatively long lasting and their combined defence spend in 2031 will be USD25 billion less than initially expected: USD165 billion versus USD190 billion.”

Our market-leading solutions enable organisations to identify and query key information that drives clear decision-making in their daily tasks. The processes, sources, and expert judgement that make up Janes tradecraft enables us to offer the highest level of assurance. We continue to offer the objective open-source intelligence and analytics that the world of defence and security relies upon, delivered by our award-winning team of analysts.

I’m excited to be joining Jane’s and for the opportunity to drive the expansion of Jane’s unique data and analysis. I’m passionate about accelerating business growth and look forward to joining the team at this crucial time in Jane’s development.

I’m delighted that Susan has joined Jane’s and I’m confident that her strong background in Sales and data services will further accelerate Jane’s growth. Susan will lead our global go-to-market and partnerships strategy to ensure that we find new ways to deliver the trusted open source intelligence that our customers rely on.

In these times when the world’s attention is distracted, it’s important to remember that other global security threats have not disappeared. This analysis shows that the site near Sil-li will likely be operational by the end of this year or in early 2021, and that will mean another step forward for North Korea’s already potent ballistic missile programme.

In this presidential year I might expect some fireworks between mandatory spending on the one hand and discretionary defence spending on the other.

With an expected fiscal downturn Jane’s anticipates downward pressure on the defence budget. At this point, it is too early to predict how fast and how much the defence budget will drawdown.

Jane’s forecasts Japan to have the largest market forecast for military aviation in East Asia over the next 10 years – hitting aroundUSD70 billion .

The increase in Taliban activity – with an 87.6% increase of Taliban-attributed attacks – has taken the group to be the world’s deadliest, with casualties exceeding the total number for the next nine groups combined.