On 27 May, DCNS Research, the Group’s recently established umbrella division for R&D and technology, celebrated the twenty-fifth anniversary of the founding of R&D subsidiary Sirehna. The celebration was part of the Research & Naval Industry Forum organised by DCNS at ECN (École Centrale de Nantes). Patrick Boissier, Chairman & CEO of DCNS, and Alain Bovis, Chairman & CEO of Sirehna, attended the event.
Aside from the opportunity to celebrate an anniversary, the forum set out to discuss how to promote interactivity between government authorities, universities – particularly university-based researchers – and companies to promote innovation while accommodating the complexities of the naval industry. If the French naval defence industry is to remain competitive and preserve its strengths over the coming decade, it must find ways to overcome technological challenges faster than its competitors and anticipate disruptive breakthroughs.
The discussions covered four topics:
- the scope and dynamics of the economic and industrial challenge;
- sharing for faster understanding; SMEs,
- large groups and their joint quest for excellence;
- synergies between academia, companies and local government to make the industry more competitive.
DCNS Research, which includes both the Group’s Indret-based Cesman R&D centre for naval materials and structures and the Sirehna teams, thus set out to give new impetus to the Group’s innovation strategy.
1986: Sirehna founded as a joint spinoff of engineering school ECN (École Centrale de Nantes), French institute of marine research and exploration IFREMER and the Nantes Saint-Nazaire chamber of commerce and industry, or CCI.
Sirehna specialises in vessel dynamics and allied technologies. The company’s 55 high-level researchers offer multidisciplinary expertise spanning naval hydrodynamics, fluid mechanics, experimental technologies, design optimisation and wave propagation. Sirehna was acquired by DCNS in 2008. The company played a key role in the design and development of the stabilisation solution for the FREMM multimission frigate programme. Sirehna is also active in stabilisation, positioning and automatic control solutions for unmanned aerial and surface vehicles (UAVs & USVs).
Wholly-owned DCNS subsidiary Sirehna was made part of DCNS Research in 2011.