Skip to content
NB Tech NewsSubscribe

News4 min read

UNB Joins a Transatlantic Alliance on Deployable Defence Infrastructure

The Marshall Land Research Alliance pairs UNB with two Welsh universities and Marshall Land Systems, which builds mission modules for the Canadian Army's new logistics trucks in Moncton.

Closing card: the UNB and Marshall Land Systems logos over a New Brunswick outline with pins on Fredericton and Moncton, linked across the Atlantic to an outline of Wales with pins on Cardiff and Pontypridd, above the words Marshall Land Research Alliance

The University of New Brunswick has joined a new research alliance with Marshall Land Systems, Cardiff University and the University of South Wales. The four partners signed a memorandum of understanding in a virtual ceremony to form the Marshall Land Research Alliance, UNB announced on Oct. 19. Marshall first announced the alliance on Sept. 23.

The alliance will study deployable infrastructure for military and humanitarian use: facilities that can be shipped out and set up away from a permanent base. Marshall says the first projects will focus on its own deployable infrastructure, which ranges from mobile CT scanners and hospital facilities to mechanical maintenance workshops and command centres.

What the partners will do

The agreement sets up joint research and development, technology transfer and staff exchanges. UNB says these will help train the next generation of highly skilled talent and strengthen its industry partnerships.

"At UNB, we take great pride in fostering strong, mutually beneficial partnerships that help us make a meaningful impact in Canada and around the world," said David MaGee, UNB's vice-president research. "I look forward to working with Marshall Land Systems, Cardiff University, and the University of South Wales to advance innovative technologies and contribute to Canada's NATO commitments."

Gareth Williams, chief executive of Marshall Land Systems, said the alliance between Canada and the U.K. "is becoming ever more important" and that the partnership "will bring together the smartest brains in support of the effort to keep us safe and the world stable."

The Welsh partners tie it to growth at home. Marshall plans a major new assembly facility in South Wales. Louise Bright, pro vice-chancellor for enterprise, engagement and partnerships at the University of South Wales, called the alliance "a bold collaboration that will help shape the future of innovation, skills, and advanced manufacturing in South Wales." Roger Whitaker, Cardiff's pro vice-chancellor for research, innovation and enterprise, said it opens work with partners on research, innovation and workforce development.

UNB points to more than four decades of defence-aligned research with government, industry and international partners. It lists its strengths as cybersecurity, advanced manufacturing, artificial intelligence, nuclear research and Arctic monitoring.

Marshall in Moncton

Marshall Land Systems traces its roots to 1909 in Cambridge, England, and has sites in the U.K., the Netherlands and Canada. Its 82,000-square-foot manufacturing plant in Moncton opened in October 2023. Engineering and program management sit in Ottawa.

The Moncton plant has a major federal contract. On May 23, 2024, Ottawa awarded the Logistics Vehicle Modernization project to General Dynamics Land Systems–Canada and Marshall Canada in a joint venture: $1.5 billion for vehicles and equipment and $1.08 billion for long-term support, including taxes. The project replaces the Canadian Armed Forces' light and heavy logistics trucks. Marshall's part is a range of interchangeable 10- and 20-foot mission modules that mount on Mercedes-Benz Zetros trucks, and the company says they will be produced in Moncton. National Defence's 2026-27 departmental plan lists Marshall Canada in Moncton as a prime contractor and targets first delivery for fall 2027.

The company also has new owners. Indigenous-owned Flowing River Capital of Regina completed its purchase of Marshall Land Systems on Nov. 21, 2025. On Oct. 15, Marshall said it is now a Certified Indigenous Business with the Canadian Council for Indigenous Business.

Sources

ChronologyUNB· 43 stories since Nov 20, 2024

  1. UNB Joins a Transatlantic Alliance on Deployable Defence Infrastructure (this story)
  2. Hack Atlantic: 43 Student Projects in One Weekend at UNB
Chronology · show all 43 stories
  1. Vidova Plugin Lets Claude Edit Video on a Real Timeline
  2. Senator Spotlights UNB's DAIR and Picketa as Proof of New Brunswick's 'Innovation Sandbox'
  3. UNB Researcher Is Designing a Radio Instrument to Map Space Weather at the Moon
  4. C-Therm's Path From a Team of Two in 2007 to Customers Worldwide
  5. UNB Inventors Were Granted 10 Patents in 2025–26, Tying a Decade High
  6. DataNB's ICT Workforce Study: N.B. Keeps Its Tech Grads for a Year, Then Loses Many
  7. Gray Wolf Analytics Brings Scam-Detection Playbook to UNB's RBC Lunch & Learn
  8. McKenna Institute Pulls District Tech Leads to Chelmsford to Scale Teacher Upskilling
  9. Sussex Elementary Opens a Saber STEAM Studio for Robotics and 3D Printing
  10. UNB Joins $5M National Push to Keep AI Weather Forecasts Grounded in Physics
  11. UNB's Fifth-Scale ATV Predicts the Ground Under Each Wheel — and Left AI Out of It
  12. Mastercard's Canada Security VP Keynoted CIC's Fredericton Summit — Then Toured the IoT Lab It Funds
  13. UNB Names Its First Digital Agriculture Chair — and He Starts With Small Farms
  14. UNB Sent Middle Schoolers Back to Class With Games, Websites and AI
  15. Review: UNB's Scott Bateman on the Three AI Myths That Won't Die
  16. UNB's Machine Learning Health Vault Wins CFI Infrastructure Funding
  17. UNB Co-Authors Confirm the First Native Sulfur Ever Found on Mars
  18. UNB Researchers Threat-Model the Protocols That Let AI Agents Act
  19. UNB Researchers Build a Practical Roadmap for the Post-Quantum Migration
  20. UNB Poster Weighs the Privacy Cost of Federated-Learning Aggregation
  21. UNB Researchers Deploy Collaborative AI Agents to Guard Power-Substation Networks
  22. UNB Researchers Build a Mixture-of-Experts Defence Against Adversarial AI Attacks
  23. UNB Researchers Make AI Malware Detection Explainable with a 'Dual Prototype' Framework
  24. UNB Researcher Takes a Geometric Axe to Optimization's Symmetry Problem
  25. UNB Researcher's 'Trust Passport' Would Stamp Every AI Reply with Its Risk Profile
  26. National Cyber Agencies and Big Banks Head to Fredericton for UNB's Cybersecurity Summit
  27. When the First Canadian Flew to the Moon, Fredericton Was Listening
  28. UNB Partners with Talent Innovation Canada to Put Grad Talent Inside Industry R&D
  29. McKenna Connect Puts UNB Mentors Beside 250 Rural Neighbours
  30. Cybersecurity Pioneer Ali Ghorbani Named to the Order of New Brunswick
  31. McKenna Institute's TeXplore Turns 17 Days Off School Into Soldering, Robots and AI
  32. SeaGreen Puts Seaweed Biochar in Ten Queen Street Flower Planters
  33. UNB Stitches Its Startup Machinery Into One Network
  34. Creduman Takes Top Spot at UNB’s MTME: NEXT 2026
  35. Four UNB MTME Startups Launch Next Week at MTME: NEXT
  36. The UNB Startup Pipeline: How a Fredericton Campus Keeps Minting Companies
  37. How Fredericton Became a Cybersecurity Town
  38. A Century of Circuits: UNB's Electrical Engineering Program Turns 100
  39. First Cheques: UNB's Fraser Fund Backs SpatialOne, Profitual, and AinaTest
  40. Gray Wolf Analytics: Crypto Forensics from a Fredericton Classroom
  41. Three Years In, the McKenna Institute Is Quietly Rewiring New Brunswick

Related coverage

Tags