The Largest Weapons Manufacturers Outside the US

By Angelo Young
16 January 2023

For the first time in history, the world spent more than $2 trillion on its militaries in 2021. Most of that came from the $801 billion the United States spent on defense, more than the $777 billion spent by the next nine countries combined.

With such a massive budget, the U.S. also has the world’s largest domestic defense industry, which includes large, well-established names such as Lockheed Martin, Raytheon Technologies, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics, and many more. But what about the rest of the world’s largest weapons makers and military services providers? (These are the companies profiting the most from war.)

To determine the 25 largest arms-producing and military services companies outside of the U.S., 24/7 Wall St. reviewed data from the report “The SIPRI Top 100 Arms-producing and Military Services Companies, 2021,” published by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. Defense contractors headquartered outside of the U.S. were ranked based on arms-related revenue in 2021. Data on total revenue also came from SIPRI. All of these companies also generate revenue from non-military enterprises.

Out of the 25 companies on the list, seven are Chinese state-owned enterprises. They include the China State Shipbuilding Corporation and China Electronics Technology Group Corporation, which provides IT infrastructure and electronic hardware to civilian and military enterprises. CETC was among several Chinese companies the U.S. sanctioned in 2020 for its involvement in building artificial islands in the South China Sea as part of China’s efforts to assert military maritime dominance in the region.

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