Attempts to get orders have limited success.
Probably because there are those that think they know what the customer wants rather than listen and give the customer what it wants. Oh, and I don’t mean an overpriced underperforming version of something someone else already manufactures!
Mantis was a classic example of this. The customer kept telling the manufacturer what it wanted, those requirements were ignored, so the customer went to a foreign manufacturer that listened and they are now on contract to deliver a certifiable product that will give the customer what it wanted. Indeed that same foreign company invested its own money into developing its own product, knowing that it would sell (and it has, like hot cakes!) by understanding what its customer base wanted.
During my quarter of a century as a customer I have seen this time and again from various UK defence contractors and all of them have either gone bust or been bought out by other companies. The orders were there for the taking but eventually went to other non-UK companies as ours were either unwilling to listen to their customers or wanted way above the market rate.
The B Word