EDEX 2025: Egypt Reveals X29 Weapon Station With Thales FZ275 Long-Range Guided Rockets.

Egypt’s Arab International Optronics introduced a new version of its X29 remote weapon station at EDEX 2025 in Cairo, pairing a 12.7 mm M2 heavy machine gun with Thales FZ275 laser-guided rockets. The upgrade highlights Egypt’s push to field affordable, longer-range precision firepower for static defense sites and mobile platforms.

At the Egypt Defence Expo in Cairo, Arab International Optronics showed a noticeably evolved X29 remote weapon station that now carries Thales’s FZ275 laser-guided rockets above a 12.7 mm M2 machine gun. Company representatives described the hybrid system as a practical step toward giving Egyptian forces a compact precision strike tool that can be locally produced. The turret photographed on the AIO stand reflects a growing focus on cost-conscious guided effects, a trend defense officials in several regions have been watching closely.
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X29 remote weapon station with 12.7 mm gun and twin FZ275 laser-guided 70 mm rockets, offering remote day/night precision fire out to 7 km (Picture source: Army Recognition Group).

At its core, the X29 remains the in-house designed remote weapon station that first appeared at EDEX 2021, developed by Arab International Optronics, a joint venture pairing Thales and Egypt’s National Service Products Organisation. The original X29 was conceived primarily for static base protection and could mount either a 12.7 × 99 mm M2HB or a 14.5 mm KPVT heavy machine gun, with a non-stabilized mount but a sophisticated electro-optic package and automatic video tracking. The new configuration keeps that architecture but adds two side-by-side 70 mm rocket tubes over the gun, turning the system into a compact precision strike node.

The turret displayed at EDEX couples the M2 heavy machine gun with the Thales FZ275 Laser Guided Rocket. The FZ275 is a 70 mm semi-active laser-guided munition with a range from about 1.5 km out to 7 km and a circular error probable of around one meter at 6 km, using four folding canards for control. Its 4.1 kg high-explosive prefragmented warhead offers a lethal radius of roughly nine meters against soft targets and light armor, providing an effects envelope previously reserved for higher cost anti-tank missiles.

The X29’s optronics appear unchanged but are central to the new concept. The remote station combines a 1920 × 1080 day camera with 30× optical zoom and an uncooled 640 × 480 thermal imager operating in the 8–14 μm band. The day sight can detect a vehicle out to about 8 km in a narrow field of view, while the thermal channel provides reliable human detection beyond 2.5 km. A laser range finder with roughly 4.5 km range and ±1 m accuracy underpins the ballistic computer and the laser designation solution for the FZ275. The turret traverses a full 360 degrees with elevation from roughly minus 20 to plus 45 degrees, and the weapon station weighs around 170 kg without armament, light enough for installation on light armored vehicles, fixed towers, or small surface platforms.

From an operational standpoint, the X29 and FZ275 pairing offers a layered engagement scheme. The 12.7 mm gun delivers suppressive and point fire against infantry, light vehicles, and close drones out to 1.5 to 2 km, while the guided rockets extend precision strike to 7 km against command posts, radar sites, parked aircraft, or light armored vehicles, exactly the target set the FZ275 was developed for in recent land applications and counter-UAS studies. Because both weapons are aimed through the same electro-optic head, the gunner can confirm identification at long range, laser the target, and hand off a guidance cue to the rocket with minimal timeline between detection and engagement.

The system is clearly designed with remote and unattended operations in mind. Control is performed from a protected shelter or vehicle interior, with automatic video tracking, burst selection, and a shot counter already fielded on earlier X29 units. The EDEX brochure highlights the ability to interface the station via cable or radio with long-range surveillance cameras and radar, hinting at integration into a wider border security or coastal defense network. In practical terms, a platoon of such turrets could protect air bases, energy infrastructure, or canal approaches while keeping personnel under armor or underground.

Industrial cooperation is the other story behind the turret on display: AIO brings local mechanical production, electronics, and optics, while Thales Belgium contributes its FZ rocket family and guidance know-how. A similar logic has emerged in other European partnerships where the FZ275 is being integrated onto remote stations to create cost-effective precision and counter-drone solutions. For Egypt, the X29 rocket-armed variant anchors that same technology on a domestically controlled platform, opening export prospects in Africa and the Middle East for customers who want guided effects but cannot afford top-tier missile systems.

Compared with established Western remote stations such as Rheinmetall’s Fieldranger Dual or Kongsberg’s Protector family, which can integrate 12.7 mm guns and anti-tank missiles on fully stabilized mounts, the Egyptian X29 remains a simpler and likely cheaper proposition aimed at static or low mobility roles. Its advantage lies not in multi-axis stabilization but in combining a mature heavy machine gun with a relatively lightweight, long-range precision rocket that closes the gap between unguided 70 mm rounds and full-scale missiles. For many countries, that balance of cost, local industrial content, and credible precision lethality may prove attractive as the global market for land remote weapon stations continues to expand.

For potential foreign users, the X29 with FZ275 rockets could be installed on border outposts, desert surveillance towers, light armored trucks, or even unmanned ground vehicles, creating a modular fire support package that can be slaved to national surveillance networks. In an era of saturated drone and missile threats, Egypt’s new hybrid turret shows how a mid-tier defense industry can leverage targeted cooperation with a European prime to field a distinctive and exportable precision weapon system.