Hey,

There's a company based in a small Norwegian town of 26,000 people that supplies missiles to NATO navies, builds the navigation systems running on thousands of merchant vessels, and is actively developing the technology that will define how ships are operated in the coming decades.

Most people in maritime have heard the name. Far fewer know the full picture.

Kongsberg Gruppen — known simply as KONGSBERG — has been operating continuously since 1814. That's older than Norway's constitution. Older than the steam-powered merchant ship. Older than most countries that currently have a maritime industry. And in 2024, it generated NOK 48.9 billion in revenue — roughly $4.4 billion — while sitting on an order backlog of NOK 128 billion at year-end, growing to NOK 134 billion by Q1 2025.

This edition is about what KONGSBERG is, where it came from, and why the maritime industry in particular should be paying close attention to what it's building right now.