Atlas Defense could become the first company of the Bayraktar brothers to produce drones in Africa, while the order book of the leaders of the Turkish giant is growing on the continent.
It was through a legal announcement buried in the 500 pages of the Moroccan Official Bulletin that the kingdom’s press learned, on January 29, of the existence of the Atlas Defense company, newly registered with the Rabat commercial court. Revealed the next day by the online media Le Desk, the news sparked a burst of articles, with all the media interest in this company based on the identity of its owners: Haluk and Selçuk Bayraktar.
You can share an article by clicking on the share icons at the top right of it. The total or partial reproduction of an article, without the prior written authorization of Le Monde, is strictly prohibited. For more information, consult our general conditions of sale. For any authorization request, contact syndication@lemonde.fr. As a subscriber, you can gift up to five items per month to one of your loved ones using the “Gift an Item” feature. https://www.lemonde.fr/afrique/article/2025/02/07/le-maroc-nouvelle-terre-de-production-des-drones-turcs_6536325_3212.html The two brothers are at the head of Baykar, the flagship of the Turkish military industry and exporter of armed drones – nearly 2 billion euros in sales in 2023. Haluk, 46, is the president. Selçuk, a year younger, the technical director, best known for being the son-in-law of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. In Morocco, the Bayraktar brothers are not in unknown territory. Since 2021, the Moroccan army has purchased around twenty Bayraktar TB2 armed drones from Baykar. These surveillance and attack devices have proven themselves during the conflicts in Libya and Syria, and in the high-intensity wars in Nagorno-Karabakh and Ukraine. The Moroccan military uses them in Western Sahara against the separatists of the Polisario Front. The royal armed forces also received Akinci models, flying at higher altitudes
