Eurometaal is one of the leading ammunition producing companies of the Netherlands. Its headquarters are in Zaandam.

History

Originally, Eurometaal is an industrial military complex that set up camp in Zaandam around 1900, and adopted the name Eurometaal in 1973. Eurometaal has developed weaponry for the

Royal Netherlands Army The Royal Netherlands Army ( nl, Koninklijke Landmacht) is the land branch of the Netherlands Armed Forces. Though the Royal Netherlands Army was raised on 9 January 1814, its origins date back to 1572, when the was raised – making the Dutc ...

from NR20 C1 hand grenades to tanks. In the nineties, an employee of the hand grenade factory in Liebenau revealed that their grenades were used in the Kurdish-Turkish conflict, which created a PR nightmare and led to the shutdown of the factory in Germany in 1993. The arms created in Germany had transited through the Netherlands before being delivered to Turkey, amid a German ban on arm trades with Turkey. Eurometaal was a producer M864 and M483A1 projectiles. It also had the licence to produce American DPICMs that it was producing both in Zaandam (since 1989) and in Turkey through a partnership with MKEK (since 1994). This production stopped in 2002. Following the European defense conversion program, Eurometaal successfully diversified its activities to gear to civilians, by laying off hundreds of employees and acquiring existing civil companies. In 1999,

Rheinmetall Rheinmetall AG is a German automotive and arms manufacturer, headquartered in Düsseldorf, Germany. Its shares are traded on the Frankfurt stock exchange. History Rheinmetall was founded in 1889. Banker and investor Lorenz Zuckermandel L ...

increased its stake in Eurometaal to 66%. In 2002, Rheinmetall sold Eurometaal's subsidiary Intergas (manufacturer of furnaces and boilers) and closed Eurometaal altogether.

References

Companies based in North Holland Defence companies of the Netherlands {{Netherlands-company-stub