OHB's Bremen Outpost Brings the Bundeswehr's €35 Billion Space Ambitions to Its Front Door

The Bundeswehr's procurement agency establishes a satellite office near OHB, aligning with a €35B space budget and OHB's new KIRK joint venture for tactical space systems.

A new satellite office of Germany's federal defence procurement agency is taking shape in Bremen, and the address couldn't be more telling. The Bundesamt für Ausrüstung, Informationstechnik und Nutzung der Bundeswehr (BAAINBw) plans to establish an outpost dedicated to naval and space equipment directly next to OHB's headquarters. For the Bremen-based space company, the move is less about local politics and more about proximity to the people who sign the contracts.

Mayor Andreas Bovenschulte called it a "knighting of Bremen as an innovation location" on Tuesday evening, capping months of lobbying. Defence Minister Boris Pistorius is expected to disclose the number of positions at the new site by June 30. But the strategic message is already clear: the Bundeswehr is reorganising its procurement to better serve the domains of land, air, sea, cyber, and — critically — space.

That reorganisation dovetails neatly with OHB's own push into military space operations. On May 19, the company announced the formation of KIRK, a joint venture with Helsing, Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace, and HENSOLDT. The consortium is targeting the Bundeswehr's SPOCK-2 programme, which aims to build a tactical system for surveillance, reconnaissance, and target acquisition from orbit. The core technology involves software-defined satellites and artificial intelligence to compress the time between data collection and battlefield action.

The political tailwind is substantial. Pistorius has pencilled in roughly €35 billion for space-related defence spending by 2030. That figure makes the new BAAINBw office in Bremen more than a symbolic gesture — it is a logistical node for a multi-billion-euro pipeline. OHB already serves as the prime contractor for the SARah reconnaissance satellite system, which replaced the older SAR-Lupe network, giving it a proven track record with the military.

The stock market has taken notice, albeit with some volatility. OHB shares broke out of a sideways pattern in late April and surged almost 30% to a peak of €629 on Tuesday. Profit-taking then knocked the price back by roughly €80, closing at €549, before the stock stabilised at €555.00 in mid-day XETRA trading on Wednesday. The sharp swings reflect a market that likes the strategic narrative but is waiting for hard financial details on KIRK — capital commitments, contract volumes, and a timeline remain undisclosed.

So far the fundamentals offer reassurance. First-quarter revenue climbed 15% to €200.8 million, while the adjusted EBITDA margin reached 9.7%. Earnings per share more than doubled to €0.52 from €0.20 a year earlier. The order backlog hit a record €3.35 billion, with the Space Systems division accounting for €2.68 billion — a 45% increase year-on-year.

Management's medium-term targets point to further expansion: revenue of €1.7 billion next year and more than €2 billion the year after, with EBITDA margin rising to 11% this year and continuing to improve. Beyond the defence agenda, OHB is also pursuing civilian projects. Together with Dassault Aviation, it plans to propose the VORTEX-S multi-purpose spacecraft to the European Space Agency, with Dassault as lead architect and OHB integrating the service module.

The annual general meeting is scheduled for June 8 in Bremen, where a cash dividend of €0.60 per share is proposed. By June 30, the government is expected to clarify the size of the new BAAINBw outpost. For OHB investors, that date may bring a clearer picture of just how big the Bremen procurement hub will become — and how much of the €35 billion space budget will land directly at their doorstep.