Family firm takes on the big guns

From relative obsucrity a decade ago, family-owned business NIOA now plays an important – and growing – role on the defence scene.

Robert Nioa, CEO of family-owned business NIOA, has emerged from relative obscurity only a decade ago and now plays an important – and growing – role on the defence scene.

A definite dark horse in the race to find an industry partner for the Sovereign Guided Weapons Enterprise is Queensland-based NIOA, which has formed the Australian Missile Corporation.

NIOA is a family-owned business that has emerged from relative obscurity only a decade ago to now be a serious contender having pulled together an industry partnership involving numerous companies such as huge US defence contractor L3Harris, UK science and technology specialist QinetiQ, and one of Israel’s most important missile and space manufacturers IAI.

The driving force behind this is the current chief executive Robert Nioa, who joined the business established by his father in 1997 and which started as an importer of firearms and ammunition for sporting shooters.

From such humble beginnings, the company now plays an important – and growing – role on the defence scene, supplying the army with a great deal of ammunition, 40mm grenade launchers as well as expertise in the selection of future infantry weapons.

It has a close relationship with German armoured vehicle and munitions specialist Rheinmetall, which is producing the Boxer 8x8 for the army.

Asked about his willingness to invest in the Australian military munitions sector, Mr Nioa says: “The best examples of that are the $60m munitions plant in Maryborough where within two years we transformed a greenfield site into the most advanced facility of its kind in the world, creating a new capability for the ADF, as well as export opportunities; and also Benalla where we have spent $13m rejuvenating capability that had become rundown and under-utilised.”

The chairman of the AMC is former defence minister Christopher Pyne, who says: “Robert Nioa has seen with clarity the opportunity presented to Australian industry to take advantage of two things – a massive increase in Australian government defence spending since 2015 and a new focus on sovereign defence industry capability by the ADF and Russell Hill.

“The difference between Robert and many others in the Australian defence industry is that, rather than waiting for government to do everything for him, he has put NIOA and the AMC in a position to contribute by investing in plant, people and infrastructure.

“Critically, he gets that defence industry is part of the national security of Australia.

“In the Indo-Pacific now presented to us through the actions of other countries, we must be able to defend ourselves in the event that we are cut off from our great and powerful ally in the USA.”

In the competition to find a strategic guided weapons partner, NIOA has the advantage of being 100 per cent Australian-owned with a good track record of delivering to the ADF.

To this can be added entrepreneurship and agility that many of the larger, better established defence manufacturers appear to lack. Any competitor that writes off the AMC as an upstart does so at their peril.

NIOA has taken on – and beaten – bigger industry incumbents before and may well do so again.