Milkor (Pty) Ltd

Milkor is a privately held South African manufacturer based at Hennopspark in Centurion, known since 1981 for the six-shot 40mm multiple grenade launcher that carries its name and has been taken into service in more than 50 countries. From 2017 the company restructured around four platform domains, Air, Land and Sea, with a cyber unit sitting alongside them, and turned itself from a small-arms house into a builder of complete systems. The weapons line is still the commercial base. It runs from the MGL Mk1S and Mk1L 40mm launchers through the SuperSix multi-range grenade launcher, which empties a six-round rotating cylinder in under three seconds, to an under-barrel launcher for assault rifles, the Stopper Convertible single-shot design that switches between 40mm lethal and 37 or 38mm less-lethal ammunition, the Multiple Anti-Riot launcher for public order units, and an occluded eye gunsight for aimed grenade fire. Air is the division that changed the company's profile. The Milkor 380 is the largest medium-altitude long-endurance unmanned aircraft designed and built in Africa, a nine metre airframe with an 18.6 metre wingspan that first flew in September 2023 and is offered with endurance of up to 30 hours and beyond line of sight control. Payload options cover electro-optical and infrared turrets, synthetic aperture and inverse synthetic aperture radar, and communications and signals intelligence packages, and the aircraft is marketed as free of US International Traffic in Arms Regulations content, which matters to buyers who would rather avoid Washington export approvals. Land brings the Vanguard, a mine-resistant vehicle of roughly 16 tonnes certified to STANAG 4569 Level 4a and 4b that seats ten, together with the BushCat armoured personnel carrier and the Frontier 4x4 light tactical platform. Sea covers the 16.5 metre Commander patrol boat, an inshore patrol craft built as a fast catamaran, and a 30 metre interceptor with a deck sized for a helicopter or an unmanned aircraft, unveiled in Abu Dhabi and entering production through the company's Emirati subsidiary. Cyber closes the loop with secure communications and defensive services sold to the same government customers who buy the hardware. An earlier generation of the company built the 9mm BXP submachine gun, a design it no longer makes. The Milkor 380 climbs to a service ceiling near 23,000 feet and is quoted at a range beyond 4,000 kilometres under satellite control, which places it alongside Turkish and Chinese export unmanned aircraft rather than the hand-launched tactical systems most African forces have bought so far. Around 450 people work for the group. Manufacturing is split between South Africa and the United Arab Emirates, and the two-country structure gives Milkor a Gulf industrial base while keeping design and much of the machining at home. Management has been publicly critical of how South Africa treats its own defence industry, arguing at industry conferences for firmer public and private arrangements to keep engineering skills in the country, and the company has used exhibitions in Brazil, the Gulf and South Africa to push a full product line rather than the launchers alone.