Full Speed Ahead for GCAP

Since its formulation in December 2024, the joint venture between BAE Systems, Leonardo, and Japan Aircraft Industrial Enhancement—named Edgewing in June 2025—has been ramping up its operations to meet an aggressive timeline for fielding of the Global Combat Air Programme, due to enter service in 2035. This is the new “sixth-generation” fighter being developed and fielded on an equal basis by Italy, Japan, and the UK.

Edgewing acts as the prime contractor for the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP) and, as such, is the industrial entity that is developing and delivering the aircraft. It received its first contract in April, with £686 million allocated for investment in key technology development. A second contract, worth £4.6 billion, was awarded earlier in July to fund the concept assessment phase, which is due to complete in December 2027, as well as continued technology development.

From the end of next year, the detailed design phase of the program will commence. Additional GCAP-related technology development and demonstration is also being undertaken on a national basis, such as by the UK’s Tempest program.

Overall management for the new fighter is handled by the trinational GCAP International Government Organization, which interfaces on a day-to-day basis with the Edgewing industrial entity via the GCAP Agency. This executive body is entrusted with ensuring that the mutually agreed operational requirements set by the respective governments and defense ministries are met.

The chief executives of both Edgewing and the agency are confident that they can avoid some of the pitfalls that have dogged other multinational programs, and both report strong government support and full alignment between the three nations at both industrial and political levels. Having Edgewing as the prime contractor removes potentially destructive competition between industrial partners, and the whole GCAP program is built on an equal three-way share. The venture is busy establishing offices at Turin, Nagoya, and Warton, the main locations of the three national industrial leads.

In terms of industrial workshare, Edgewing CEO Marco Zoff said that a fairly detailed framework plan is already in place, including down to fourth- and fifth-tier supplier levels, but it is not set in concrete by any means. Work is being shared out with the aim of having no redundancy of effort across the trinational concern, but a delicate balance is required between maintaining an equal split and providing the best possible capability. “We don’t want to invest in weakness,” remarked Zoff.

Production plans concerning locations of final assembly lines and the logistics of moving components between sites have yet to be established, although it was anticipated that each of the three nations would assemble aircraft.

As a whole, GCAP remains open to other nations joining the program in some form or other, either in what the GCAP Agency’s chief executive, Masami Oka, calls “wider partnering” or as observers, with Canada expected to announce that it will follow the latter path imminently. Adding partners that can bring new or improved technology would only benefit the program, but Zoff warned that the inclusion of further partners must not be allowed to jeopardize the current timeline.