sme ordanance sdn bhd

The SME Ordnance Sdn. Bhd. Company (SMEO), formerly known as Syarikat Malaysia Explosive Sdn. Bhd., is a Malaysian defence company that specialises in the manufacturing and marketing of ordnance. The company is located in Batu Arang, Selangor.

SMEO is a subsidiary company of National Aerospace and Defence Industries Sdn. Bhd.

SME Ordnance was created in 1969 as a joint venture company with equity participation between the Goverment of Malaysia, Dynamit Nobel of Germany, Oerlikon Machine Tools of Switzerland and two local partners namely Syarikat Permodalan Kebangsaan and Syarikat Jaya Sdn. Bhd. The Malatysian goverment later acquired all shares in 1974, making SMEO a goverment-owned company. In 1991, SMEO acquired a licence to manufacture Steyr AUG rifles, joint production with Steyr later started in 2003 and 2004.

On 28 September 1993, SMEO was approved by Royal Ordnance Division, British Aerospace (BAe) as the preferred suppliers of weapons and ammunition. The Standards and Industrial Research Institute of Malaysia (SIRIM) bestowed & registered SMEO's quality system as compliant with MS ISO 9002:1991 systems on 7 December 1993.

SME Ordnance had acquired the licence to manufacture M4 carbines in 2006-2007 with coit Defence, as announced by Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak after he gave SMEO a letter of intent to procure 14,000 rifled to replace the Steyr AUG. In 2009, SMEO announced that they would invest RM36.4 million for further research and development into the M4. The amount consists of RM26.4 million, which will be for the purchase of machinery and RM10 million for the buildings. 14,000 M4's will be supplied to the Malaysian army. Under the ASEAN Defence Industry Collaboration programme. Malaysia plans to produce the M4 carbine together with Indonesia and Thailand.