SOFIA (Bulgaria), October 8 (SeeNews) – Bulgaria’s biggest arms producer Arsenal raised its sales by 150% on the year to 70 million levs ($48.8 million/35.8 million euro) through August and expects 100 million levs in turnover for all of 2008, Pari daily reported on Wednesday.
“Good financial results this year are owing mainly to the launch of new products,” Pari quoted the company as saying in a statement. It gave no comparative figures.
At present, 15% of the company's output consists of products for civilian use, including metal processing machines. Arsenal (www.arsenal.bg), based in the southern city of Kazanlak, has a staff of 5,500 and exports 98% of its production. It produces Kalashnikov assault rifles under licence from Russia, small arms, hunting rifles and ammunition.
Bulgaria’s defence industry output was worth 400 million levs ($322.5 million/205 million euro) last year, state-run news agency BTA reported on Wednesday without providing comparative figures.
Bulgarian arms producers export almost all of their output to traditional markets like North Africa and Europe, while just 1.5% went to the Bulgarian army last year, BTA quoted Deputy Economy Minister Yavor Kuyumdjiev as saying at an international defence equipment exhibition held in Plovdiv, in southern Bulgaria.
The 2007 exports of Bulgarian arms and military equipment were at par with the 2006 level, but way below exports in the Communist era when revenue peaked at $1.0 billion (732.9 million euro).
(1 euro=1.95583 Bulgarian levs)
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