“The total value of today’s agreements is more than €8.5 billion ($9.57 billion),” Volodymyr Zelensky said. He gave the figure on Oct. 5, a day after German Chancellor Friedrich Merz arrived in Kyiv with a new aid package. The headline sum of that package itself was smaller: more than €1.3 billion ($1.46 billion), announced by the two leaders at a joint press conference on Oct. 4.
Merz travelled with Economy Minister Katherina Reiche and executives from German defense and energy firms.
What is in the package
Of the total, €1 billion ($1.13 billion) is military aid. Merz said part of it would finance interceptor drones able to counter Russia’s jet-powered weapons. “This will quickly and noticeably strengthen Ukraine’s air defense, and this reinforcement is urgently needed,” he said.
The defense side also covers “thousands” of missiles for the German-made IRIS-T air defense systems, plus more IRIS-T fire units.
The remaining sum, around €350 million ($394 million), goes to energy. It will pay for generators and for repairs to infrastructure damaged in Russian attacks, and Merz said the aim was to soften the blow to Ukraine’s power grid before winter.
Zelensky described the mix as weapons needed immediately, help for the energy sector, and money to build new interceptors designed against Russia’s jet drones. “These are weapons that will help now, support for our energy sector — this is very important,” he said. He also said a separate agreement had been signed to widen joint counter-drone work.
Companies sign up
Quantum Systems, a European drone maker, will receive German financing to produce tens of thousands of interceptors inside Ukraine. “Ukraine needs interceptor drones at industrial scale,” said Sven Kruck, the company’s co-CEO, in a press release. He added that producing in Ukraine would let the company respond faster to the immediate threat while building industrial capability that would also serve Germany and its allies.
On Oct. 4 Quantum Systems also signed a memorandum of understanding with the Ukrainian firm Fire Point, under which the two will jointly develop new unmanned-systems technology. A separate agreement was struck directly with Ukraine’s National Guard, which makes up a large part of the ground force in some of the hardest-fought sectors of the front.
National Guard commander Oleksandr Pivnenko called it strategically important for Ukraine to have an alternative to foreign systems built by its own manufacturers. Production in Germany, he said, “gives us access to additional, critically needed production capacities, while maintaining Ukrainian technologies and combat experience at the core.”
Other deals followed during the visit. Ukraine’s Culver Aerospace signed a letter of intent with Germany’s Helsing on mass production of long-range strike systems for Ukraine. Roboneers, based in Lviv, signed an MOU with ARX Robotics of Germany on ground drones. German and Ukrainian companies also agreed a framework covering 25 and 40 mm air defense systems and 155 mm artillery systems.
The deals build on joint production work already under way. In May, Berlin and Kyiv launched “Brave Germany,” an initiative backed by Ukraine’s Brave1 defense-tech platform to support companies in both countries and speed up new military technology.
The attacks behind the talks
Zelensky put the urgency in numbers. “Just this week, Russia has used more than 1,900 attack drones, 1,700 aerial bombs, and 25 missiles against Ukraine. More than 800 of the drones were jet-powered,” he said. Air defense, he added, is Ukraine’s current “number one priority,” and he and Merz discussed further steps the two countries could take together.
Earlier on Oct. 4, Merz visited the National Academy of Sciences building in central Kyiv, which a Russian drone strike damaged on Sept. 28. “Mr. Putin, stop this senseless war,” he said there, according to dpa. “We are ready for talks, we are ready to speak with one another about ending this war. But these barbaric attacks on the civilian population of Ukraine must stop.”
