Havelsan, Meteksan and MKE Unveil New Systems at Türkiye’s Nusret-2026 Naval Drill
Nusret-2026, the multinational mine-countermeasures exercise Türkiye is hosting through October 16, doubled as an industry showcase on October 7, when 16 Turkish defence companies displayed underwater and unmanned maritime systems to military delegations at the Port of Alsancak in İzmir. The event, reported by Anadolu Agency and Daily Sabah, gave Havelsan, Meteksan and state-owned MKE a stage in front of the NATO units taking part in the drill — and a chance to put several recently unveiled systems in front of foreign buyers at once.
The exercise itself, which brings together Türkiye, NATO’s Standing Mine Countermeasures Group 2 and the Black Sea Mine Countermeasures Task Group, is covered in detail separately. The October 7 display was a parallel event: no contracts or procurement announcements were tied to it, and Turkish officials framed it explicitly as a demonstration rather than a sales event.
Havelsan’s Underwater Vehicle
Havelsan showed a remotely operated underwater vehicle (ROV) developed in-house and rated to a 300-metre depth. The company, better known for simulators and naval combat-management software than for hardware, pitched the ROV for search-and-rescue work, mine countermeasures, pipeline inspection and hull surveying — tasks usually associated with commercial survey operators as much as navies. Zekiye Bilinç Serintuna, who leads the company’s underwater systems group, said the platform carries its own navigation and precision-positioning sensors, according to Daily Sabah’s report, though neither she nor the company gave a timeline for when it might reach serial production or its first customer.
Meteksan’s Sonar Pair
Meteksan brought two systems that had each already debuted separately on the exhibition circuit this year. SUVDES (Submarine and Underwater Vehicle Detection System), first shown at IDEF 2025, is built for harbour security and detecting unmanned underwater vehicles and divers approaching protected facilities. MİLSAS, a national synthetic-aperture sonar unveiled at SAHA EXPO in May, is designed to generate high-resolution seabed and target imagery — the kind of picture mine-hunting crews need to tell ordnance apart from debris. Meteksan, a Bilkent University-owned firm that has spent two decades building sonar and radar systems for Turkish submarines and surface ships, did not release new specifications for either system at Nusret-2026; the İzmir appearance functioned more as a repeat demonstration for a different, NATO-heavy audience than as a product launch.
MKE’s Naval Line-Up
MKE’s display leaned toward strike and mine warfare rather than detection. The company showed its Denizhan naval gun, the Pirana kamikaze unmanned surface vessel, the Malaman smart bottom mine, and infantry rifles adapted for naval boarding and security teams. Pirana, which MKE has tested from the amphibious ship TCG Anadolu and against surface targets in earlier exercises, is a loitering attack boat rather than a mine-countermeasures tool — its presence at Nusret-2026 reflected MKE’s broader push to bundle its naval products together at Turkish-hosted exercises rather than any direct tie to mine warfare.
| System | Company | Role | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| ROV (unnamed) | Havelsan | Underwater inspection, search and rescue, MCM support | In-house development, no disclosed customer |
| SUVDES | Meteksan | Harbour and underwater-vehicle detection | Unveiled IDEF 2025, shown again at Nusret-2026 |
| MİLSAS | Meteksan | Synthetic-aperture sonar imaging | Unveiled SAHA EXPO 2026 |
| Denizhan | MKE | Naval gun | In MKE’s naval catalogue |
| Pirana | MKE | Kamikaze unmanned surface vessel | Tested from TCG Anadolu |
| Malaman | MKE | Smart bottom mine | Described by MKE as Türkiye’s first |
Why a Mine-Warfare Drill Draws an Industry Crowd
The Black Sea has had a live mine problem since 2022, when floating mines began washing up on the coasts of Türkiye, Romania and Bulgaria after drifting from contested waters. That threat is the backdrop for Nusret-2026 and for Türkiye’s wider investment in mine-hunting and underwater-detection equipment — an area where Turkish shipyards have also been active with purpose-built minehunters. For companies like Meteksan, a NATO-flagged exercise hosted on Turkish soil is a lower-cost way to reach foreign military observers than a standalone trade show, and it lets them demonstrate equipment in a working maritime environment rather than on a static exhibition floor.
None of the systems shown on October 7 came with new performance figures, and MKE in particular has shown Pirana and Malaman at multiple events this year without disclosing unit costs or confirmed export orders. The display is best read as routine but useful positioning — a signal to the NATO navies in town for Nusret-2026 that Türkiye’s mine-warfare and underwater-systems suppliers are still adding products, not a record of new business.
Sources: Daily Sabah with Anadolu Agency, October 7, 2026.
