On December 15, local time, Hungary** announced that it had signed a major agreement with the German Rheinmetall Group. The agreement will promote the local production and certification of the new generation KF51 Panther main battle tank in Hungary. The value of the agreement is about 2The 8.8 billion euros were officially signed in the municipality of Zolo Egersegg, in the canton of Zolo. The project is a joint venture between Rheinmetall and the Hungarian state-owned holding company N7, which holds a 49 percent stake in the joint venture Rheinmetall Hungary. 
In recent years, defense cooperation between Hungary and Germany has been strengthened, and the purchase of main battle equipment for the army has also increased significantly. In December 2018, the Hungarian Ministry of Defense signed a contract with Klaus-Maffei Wiegmann for a total price of 5The $6.5 billion military purchase contract includes 24 PZH-2000 self-propelled howitzers, 12 Leopard 2A4 main battle tanks and 44 Leopard 2A7 main battle tanks. Subsequently, in September 2020, Hungary signed a €2 billion arms trade contract with Rheinmetall to order up to 218 KF-41 Lynx heavy infantry fighting vehicles and related services to replace 384 BTR-80 Type 80A wheeled infantry fighting vehicles for its army. And in November 2021, Hungary purchased an additional 245 KF-41 "Bobcat" heavy infantry fighting vehicles from Rheinmetall, making it the largest overseas equipment country for KF-41. 
It is worth noting that the signing of the agreement on the local production of the KF-51 "Panther" tank coincided with the official reception of the first "Leopard" 2A7 main battle tank by the Hungarian Army. Just as former German Defense Minister Thomas Hilbohorn said, after the Hungarian army obtains this new batch of German-made equipment, it will enhance its interconnection with the German army, and will help improve NATO's collective defense capability and NATO's ability to cooperate with each other, especially the military strength in Eastern Europe. 
The KF51 "Panther" main battle tank is a new main battle tank developed by the German company Rheinmetall. It is equipped with the 130 mm Future Artillery System (FGS), which offers a 50 percent increase in performance compared to the 120 mm tank guns commonly found in Western armies. The artillery system of the future can fire kinetic energy shells and programmable air** ammunition and is equipped with a 20-round automatic loader. In addition to the main artillery system, the KF51 Panther main battle tank is equipped with a variety of auxiliaries**. Among them is a point 50 caliber coaxial machine gun, one for UAV defense and melee protection systems 762 Remote Control Stations (RCWS), as well as the Hero 120 cruise missile drone. These assistance systems allow the tank to be used against targets beyond the line of sight, combining a fully integrated, comprehensive, and re-optimized survivability concept of active, inductive, and passive protection technologies. It has a preemptive detection capability, allowing the tank to destroy the threat first. 
To sum up, Hungary's arms purchase not only enhances its own military strength, but also further strengthens the position of the German company Rheinmetall in the international arms market. The signing of the agreement on the local production and certification of the KF-51 "Panther" tank marks a new step in the cooperation between Germany and Hungary in the military field.