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Defence and National Security
EY works alongside Australia’s Defence and National Security organisations to deliver integrated capabilities, drive strategic transformation, and build a resilient, future-ready force. We empower Defence to modernise, mobilise and deliver by bringing together security-cleared specialists, purpose-built solutions and global alliances. Our teams support Defence in responding to emerging threats, strengthening national resilience, and securing Australia’s interests in a rapidly evolving global environment.
Operating at the speed of relevance
Australia's national security environment is changing rapidly. Strategic competition is intensifying, disruptive technologies are reshaping the operating environment, and traditional assumptions about warning time, supply chains, capability superiority and institutional capacity can no longer be relied upon. At the same time, Defence is being asked to deliver more capability, more quickly, while managing increasing complexity and competing priorities.
To succeed in an increasingly contested environment, Defence leaders are addressing four interconnected challenges:
While each of these strategic challenges is distinct, they are shaped by a common set of enterprise-wide signature issues that cut across functions, programs and domains. These issues influence Defence's ability to deliver capability, improve readiness, modernise the enterprise and adapt to a changing strategic environment. Addressing them can help accelerate progress across multiple challenges and strengthen performance across the Defence enterprise.
Solving your complex challenges
- AI and decision advantage
- Cyber and data security
- Productivity and optimisation
- Enterprise and third-party risk
- Integrated capability delivery and enablement
THE CHALLENGE
AI and decision advantage
Defence leaders have access to more information than ever before, yet strategic advantage increasingly depends on the ability to turn information into timely, trusted decisions. Decision advantage is created when AI, trusted data and human judgement work together to improve situational awareness, anticipate threats, allocate resources effectively and support operational outcomes.
HOW EY CAN HELP
- Creating decision advantage: Enabling Defence leaders to make faster, more informed and more confident decisions in complex operating environments.
- Trusted and governed use of AI: Accelerating AI adoption through robust governance, clear accountability and trusted operating frameworks.
- Predictive sustainment and asset performance: Improving readiness through greater asset availability, reliability and predictive maintenance insights.
- Stronger data foundations for AI-enabled operations: Creating the trusted data environments needed to scale AI, improve interoperability and support operational outcomes.
FEATURED
Smart Arsenal: The Role of AI in Military Asset Management
The military can leverage AI to deliver timely, accurate data and make decisions that enhance operational readiness and effectiveness.
THE CHALLENGE
Enterprise systems, data, cyber resilience and secure cloud
Defence's ability to operate at speed depends on connected systems, trusted data and resilient digital infrastructure. Yet fragmented technology environments can limit information sharing, slow decision-making and increase vulnerability to disruption. Building a secure, resilient and connected digital backbone is critical to improving operational effectiveness, enterprise agility and operational outcomes.
HOW EY CAN HELP
- Enterprise technology transformation: modernising core systems, platforms and technology environments to improve connectivity, agility and enterprise-wide performance.
- Cyber resilience and threat protection: strengthening cybersecurity, threat detection and response capabilities to protect critical information, systems and operations.
- Sovereign control of critical data: designing secure cloud and data environments that improve accessibility, maintain compliance and safeguard sensitive information.
- Resilient digital infrastructure: improving the resilience of critical digital services and infrastructure to reduce disruption and support operational continuity.
- Enterprise integration and value realisation: connecting people, systems and processes across the enterprise to improve alignment, unlock value and support informed decision-making.
THE CHALLENGE
Productivity and optimisation
As demands on Defence continue to increase, workforce, budget and operational capacity are under growing pressure. Complexity, duplicated effort and legacy ways of working can constrain Defence's ability to generate readiness, sustain capability and deliver outcomes at pace. Improving productivity is not simply about efficiency. It is about unlocking capacity, focusing scarce resources and improving performance across the Defence enterprise.
HOW EY CAN HELP
- Improving readiness and sustainment performance: Helping Defence maximise operational readiness in an environment of increasing complexity, constrained resources and rising sustainment costs through improved performance, resource optimisation and stronger force generation outcomes.
- Smarter recruitment and workforce attraction: Redesigning recruitment approaches, workforce value propositions and data-driven talent pipelines to attract, recruit and retain critical skills more effectively.
- Optimised workforce deployment: Creating an enterprise-wide view of military, civilian and reservist talent to align skills, capability demand and workforce priorities across the Defence enterprise.
- Improved workforce experience: Enhancing career pathways, learning opportunities, rewards and support programs to strengthen workforce engagement, wellbeing and retention.
- Productivity and cost efficiency: Unlocking capacity and improving performance through workforce redesign, automation, artificial intelligence and targeted operational improvements.
FEATURED
How can Defence plan for the workforce it needs tomorrow?
Rethinking Defence workforce strategy in an era of continuous disruption.
THE CHALLENGE
Enterprise and third-party risk
Defence's ability to generate and sustain capability increasingly depends on a complex ecosystem of suppliers, partners, technologies and critical services. As strategic competition intensifies, understanding critical dependencies, sovereign capability risks and sources of geopolitical exposure has become essential to maintaining readiness and operational effectiveness.
Many of these dependencies sit beyond Defence's direct control, making it difficult to identify where vulnerabilities exist and how disruptions could affect capability outcomes. Strengthening ecosystem resilience can improve readiness, reduce risk and enhance Defence's ability to adapt to changing conditions.
HOW EY CAN HELP
- Strengthening supply chain resilience: We help Defence organisations identify critical dependencies, manage third-party risk and strengthen resilience across increasingly complex supplier and industry ecosystems.
- Mapping mission-critical dependencies: Helping Defence understand which suppliers, services, technologies and infrastructure underpin priority capabilities, where control sits and how disruption could affect operational outcomes.
- Linking third-party risk to operational consequence: Moving beyond generic supplier assurance to prioritise risks according to their effect on readiness, sustainment and sovereign freedom of action.
- Strengthening sovereign resilience: Supporting decisions on diversification, localisation, strategic stockholding and trusted partnerships where concentrated or cross-border dependencies create unacceptable exposure.
- Enabling continuous risk insight: Bringing together data, analytics and governance to monitor emerging supplier, cyber, geopolitical and continuity risks across complex Defence and industry ecosystems.
FEATURED
Is the Australian Defence industry ready to meet supply chain challenges on the horizon?
A 2025 EY survey of current and prospective suppliers suggests Defence supply chain resilience is strong, although the experience differs between direct (Primes) and indirect (Tier 2 and Tier 3) suppliers.
THE CHALLENGE
Integrated capability delivery and enablement
Australia's strategic ambitions are growing, while the scale and complexity of capability delivery continue to increase. Delivering integrated capability requires Defence to align stakeholders, systems and decisions across an increasingly interconnected ecosystem. As delivery becomes more complex, maintaining alignment across Defence, government and industry is becoming a critical determinant of operational outcomes.
HOW EY CAN HELP
- Accelerating integrated capability delivery: Defence needs to convert strategic intent into operational effect at the speed of need. We help organisations connect joint mission design, force design, technology assessment, experimentation and delivery planning to accelerate the path from mission need to fielded and sustainable capability.
- Designing around the joint mission: Translating strategic priorities into the operational effects, mission threads and integrated capability outcomes the force must deliver.
- Accelerating capability realisation: Creating a disciplined pathway from identified mission need through option development, experimentation and validation to deployable capability.
- Integrating the delivery enterprise: Aligning operational users, capability managers, acquisition, sustainment, digital, infrastructure and industry around a common outcome and a single delivery logic.
- Strengthening delivery confidence: Improving decision quality, managing dependencies and applying risk-tailored governance and assurance so that leaders can move faster without losing control.
- Planning the transition to operational use: Building adoption, integration, workforce, support and sustainment considerations into delivery from the outset so capability can be fielded, scaled and sustained.
FEATURED
How can Defence effectively deliver the nation’s most complex programs?
Australia’s Defence strategy depends on whole‑of‑economy collaboration. Building future‑ready resilience will require coordinated action at speed and at scale. The challenge is no longer defining ambition, but turning it into delivery.
How EY Delivers for Defence
Defence and national security organisations need partners who understand their operating environment and can help connect strategy, capability, technology, workforce, industry and delivery. EY combines integrated capabilities, purpose-built solutions, strategic alliances and a scalable, security-cleared workforce to help Defence modernise, strengthen resilience and deliver capability with confidence.
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