Vucic Opens Drone Factory, Bars Reporters From Tour
President Aleksandar Vucic opened a factory assembling Israeli Lanius X drones, announced at least three more plants across Serbia, and kept reporters off the tour citing production confidentiality.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic opened a factory today, September 17, that assembles drones made in Israel. The plant will employ around a hundred workers, he said, and will produce equipment for the Serbian Army as well as for export. Its exact location was not disclosed, and no journalists were invited to the opening.
The factory was first announced in December 2024, with the opening originally planned for March or April 2026. It did not materialize until September, nearly a year and a half after that first announcement. Sumanovci, where media company PR-DC, owned by Zeljko Mitrovic, would have leased production space, had earlier been floated as a possible site, along with the Utva factory in Pancevo and the Military Technical Institute in Zarkovo, though which of these was ultimately chosen has not been officially confirmed. According to reporting by the investigative network BIRN and the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Israeli company Elbit Systems holds 51 percent of the project, while the remaining 49 percent belongs to Serbia’s state owned Jugoimport SDPR.
Vucic announced the opening in an Instagram post.
“This morning I was especially proud of Serbia and its achievements. I opened a factory that assembles the most modern Israeli made drones, which will employ around a hundred workers,” the president wrote.
He added that the plan for cooperation with Israeli partners extends well beyond a single factory.
“Our plans are enormous. We believe that together with our Israeli partners we will open at least three more factories across Serbia,” Vucic wrote.
The plant will initially assemble the Lanius X combat drone, with production of the Firefox attack drone and the Magni reconnaissance drone planned for a later phase. According to Vucic’s description on the Informer television channel, the Lanius X is more expensive and technically more demanding than the domestically made Komarac drone, and most of the output goes to the Serbian Army, with the rest exported. The president noted that Serbia already has other drone manufacturers: the Military Technical Institute produces the Komarac 1 and Komarac 2, Jugoimport SDPR makes the Osica and Vrabac, and the private company PR-DC produces drones armed with 60 millimeter mortar shells.
Vucic explained that journalists were kept away from the tour because of the confidentiality of the production process itself.
“Because of the confidentiality of the production process, I did not invite journalists on the tour.”
He said the public would nonetheless eventually see part of what he is, in his words, convinced will impress them.
The president also addressed the substance of the cooperation with Israel in a video address released the same day.
“The essence of everything we are doing with the Israelis is building what is called a digital army,” Vucic said.
Speaking to Informer, he elaborated further: the goal of the cooperation, he said, is a transfer of technology that would let Serbia produce its own drones instead of depending on imports, as well as linking units through digital signals for faster decision making in the field. He also named locations for future factories: one near Ladjevci airport, another near the airport in Nis, while a third location has not yet been determined.
The drone factory opening was not the only topic Vucic addressed during his appearance on Informer that day. The president also mentioned a one time payment of 6,000 dinars, whose disbursement was announced for September 22.
The exact location of the factory, as well as the date when Serbia, according to Vucic’s own estimate of roughly a year, moves from assembly to full domestic drone production, have not yet been specified.
