Munich-based defense software company Helsing has been selected to support Germany’s Eurofighter EK program with an artificial-intelligence-enabled electronic warfare suite, marking one of the most significant attempts yet to integrate advanced AI into a front-line European combat aircraft.
The EK configuration, short for Elektronischer Kampf, will convert fifteen German Air Force Eurofighter Typhoon jets into a dedicated electronic attack and reconnaissance variant. The program teams Helsing with Saab, which supplies its Arexis electronic warfare system, under a contract intended to replace Germany’s retiring Tornado ECR fleet.
How AI will be integrated
Saab’s Arexis system provides the hardware backbone of the EK configuration, including digital receivers and an advanced escort jammer. In November 2025, Saab announced two orders from Airbus Defence and Space for the Arexis suite to equip Germany’s Eurofighters, valued at approximately 549 million euros, or about 590 million dollars. One of these tranches includes the integration pathway for Helsing’s AI capability.
Helsing’s contribution centers on Cirra, its AI-based processing software that will be embedded directly into the Arexis suite. Cirra introduces a new layer of onboard computation designed to detect, classify, and respond to hostile emitters at high speed by analyzing radar returns, electronic signatures, and threat data in real time. According to Helsing, this enables more adaptive jamming and self-protection than traditional rule-based electronic-warfare systems.
Timelines and capability goals
Germany expects the EK upgrade to be completed by 2028, with operational capability targeted in the early 2030s. The fleet will form the core of Germany’s future suppression of enemy air defense capabilities, complementing the Luftwaffe’s incoming F-35A fleet, which takes over the NATO nuclear duties previously handled by the Tornado.
Berlin first committed to the Eurofighter EK in 2023 under a package worth around 1.2 billion euros, covering Saab, Northrop Grumman, and German industrial partners to provide Germany with a modern successor to the Tornado ECR.
The program has since taken on strategic importance, influenced by lessons from Ukraine, where both sides have relied heavily on jamming, counter-jamming, and rapid software adaptation. German officials argue that the EK program is essential to ensuring the Eurofighter remains relevant through the 2030s and that its open mission-system architecture enables faster iteration than traditional avionics programs.
Growing role for AI in air combat
For Helsing, founded in 2021, the Eurofighter EK is its highest-profile integration of a combat aircraft to date. The company has also tested its Centaur AI agent with Saab’s Gripen E, part of a broader shift across Europe toward software-defined upgrades, sensor fusion and continuous mission-system refresh.
In France, the Mirage 2000D RMV has recently been used as a flying laboratory for AI-assisted mission systems, providing early insights that will feed into the Rafale F5 standard and later into the Franco-German-Spanish Future Combat Air System.
Together, these efforts point to an accelerating move toward AI-enabled mission management across Europe’s future combat aircraft.
