Building upon the Wales Defence Growth Deal and the publication of the Defence Investment Plan, Welsh SMEs are looking at one of the clearest defence, security and resilience opportunities they have had for years. Smaller businesses will play a vital role in this market, but contracts won’t follow from capability alone. They will come to those that understand the routes to market, meet the standards expected of defence suppliers and use the support available to help them leverage their capability to compete.

Those opportunities have to be converted through relationships, readiness, procurement knowledge and an understanding of where a company’s capability fits into the wider enterprise. For SMEs, particularly those not already working in defence, that can feel difficult to navigate, but it should not deter them. The value of trade association will help you with these challenges and support you in these complex environments.

ADS is the national trade association for aerospace, defence, security and space, with just over 2,000 members. Our role is to help bring trade back into businesses, domestically and internationally, by identifying ways to improve policy and legislation, creating opportunities for members to share their capabilities with end users, front-line commands and wider government departments, and helping remove those barriers that make the market harder to access.

That SME focus is central to our work. Around 95% of our members are SMEs, so when we talk about improving the ease of doing business, we are talking about the firms that often bring the innovation, specialist capability and pace that defence and security supply chains need. Those barriers can be commercial, technical or regulatory, and they can range from procurement frameworks and contracting routes to cyber security standards and quality accreditations.

The Defence Investment Plan has given industry greater clarity around future areas of investment, which is welcomed. Delivery now has to follow at pace. That means implementing defence reform within the Ministry of Defence, making proper use of the new commercial pathways, including the SME pathway, and ensuring that initiatives designed to simplify procurement are turned into practical change for businesses.

SMEs also have to engage actively. The members that are most active tend to be the best informed about risks, requirements and opportunities. They understand where the policy is moving, where the procurement routes sit and how to position their capability in front of the right people.

That is why procurement support is so important. Through our Supply Chain Solutions Framework, ADS provides an improvement programme that help companies understand how to enhance their organisational operations, whether that involves cyber security, Cyber Essentials, quality accreditations or better performance as a supplier on cost, time and delivery.

Businesses can take that further through our Supply Chain 21 accreditation scheme, which provides gold, silver and bronze status and is supported by large defence primes and MOD. For SMEs, that accreditation can help elevate them into prime and MOD supply chains, and many members that have used it have found opportunities in places they had not expected.

We also provide dedicated commercial support, including advice on contracting and procurement methodologies and guidance on the frameworks available. The procurement landscape can appear fragmented, so we are launching a framework library for members, showing which frameworks are open, which are closed, how to get on them and where the opportunities sit. The aim is to make that information far easier to understand and use.

The opportunity for Wales is especially strong because of the Wales Defence Growth Deal, in which ADS played a leading role. This deal has a clear focus on the SME community and on making it easier for smaller firms to take part. The Welsh Government, the MOD and the Department for Business and Trade are looking at establishing a secure facility for SMEs, providing an environment where businesses can hold sensitive conversations, share secure information appropriately and build consortia around specific opportunities.

That consortium-building point should not be underestimated. Wales has strengths across advanced manufacturing, cyber, autonomous systems, advanced materials, recycling and the circular economy. The Growth Deal is broader than defence alone, with a strong focus on resilience and supply chains, including the extraction and reuse of critical materials that can support autonomous systems and other capabilities. Wales is forward-leaning in this area, and there is an ambition to develop some of this work into a NATO Centre of Excellence.

The international opportunity is also significant. ADS supports the UK Government on international trade shows and helps deliver on bilateral and trilateral agreements by taking members into relevant markets. Ukraine has shown the value of that approach, with more than 10 trade missions giving members direct access to end users, insight into performance requirements and a sharper understanding of the speed of innovation needed.

The Defence Security Resilience Cymru event in September brings many of these strands together. For SMEs, primes, government, NATO procurement representatives and wider industry, it offers a practical opportunity to understand the market, build relationships and see how Welsh capability can contribute to defence, security and resilience at home and internationally.

Welsh SMEs should approach this moment with confidence, but also with preparation. The opportunity is real, and the support is there, but the businesses that will benefit most are those that engage early, understand the standards, use the available procurement support and make themselves easier for customers, primes and government to work with.

Samira talks about this and more on the Defence Security Resilience Cymru podcast. Listen here:

Find out more about Defence Security Resilience Cymru, being held at ICC Wales in Newport on September 3 and 4 2026, here: https://www.dsr.cymru/