That same year, the German Army ( Heer) placed an order for the delivery of five pre-production vehicles and their logistics and training services at the end of 2004. Planning for the Puma as the successor of the Marder began in 2002. The lessons learned were incorporated into the new tactical concept named neuer Schützenpanzer ('new IFV') in 1998. Its aim was to collect ideas for a common base vehicle that could be used for a variety of tasks including that of the APC, IFV, air defense and replacing and assisting the MBT in the frontline combat role. The Puma (formerly also named Igel (hedgehog) and Panther) started as a follow-up project to the German 1996 'NGP' project ( Neue Gepanzerte Plattformen, 'New Armored Platforms'). The Puma is one of the world's best-protected IFVs, while still having a high power-to-weight ratio. The companies responsible for this project are Krauss-Maffei Wegmann and Rheinmetall Landsysteme, which created a joint venture, Projekt System Management GmbH (PSM). A second batch of 229 Pumas received funding. Production of the first batch of 350 vehicles began in 2010 and was completed in August 2021. “It may not look like the ‘heavy’ armor on a tank, but it will be armor nonetheless,” Schoenfeld said.The Puma is a German infantry fighting vehicle (IFV) ( Schützenpanzer or short SPz) designed to replace the aging Marder IFVs currently in service with the German Army. If it takes a hit, the arms might be made of materials built to deflect those strikes from the center, where the valuable components that control, communicate or explode, reside.Īll of these advances may not look like the diesel-driven behemoths of the battlefield today, but at their core, they’ll do what armor has always done - protect soldiers while delivering firepower. Say this robot could both roll and crawl around the terrain.

Schoenfeld painted a picture: imagine a robot that looks like the coronavirus, a central ball or sphere with many “arms” protruding from it. Some future robot armor could even have materials that allow bullets to pass through. “If that material could stretch without limit, the armor would be much lighter and much more flexible.” “Think about the fact that body armor does not just stop a bullet but must do so with limited deformation and limited mortality for the human in the rear,” Schoenfeld said.

Military tanks future