Calibrated

Every industry event ends the same way: a bag full of branded goods. Most get tossed before the flight home. Some stay with you as a nice reminder of a good time. Swag is part of a brand's communications toolkit. It carries a message and an emotion, the same way a press release or a keynote does. Done right, it says something about the brand, shows care, or reflects the mission behind the work. ⤵️ Here are some of our favourite examples from this year's Eurosatory in Paris. 🔵 Merch that keeps working after the show ▪️ The Stephan Company  gave out branded plaster sets. Small, useful, easy to dismiss, and the kind of thing that sits in a bag for months. ▪️ EKOSCAN printed technical formulas on branded rulers, so engineers had a reason to keep them. ▪️ Aerovironment Inc handed out portable fans that projected the logo mid-spin. Gone within two days in the Paris heat. ▪️ MAIBACH Industrie-Plastic GmbH  foldable water bottles solved the same problem with less flash. ▪️ IABG multitools, the defence-expo classics, as well as earplugs to use at the end of the day for a moment of quiet. 🔵 Merch built around the product itself ▪️ Etronika Sp. z o.o. printed pencils showing Warsaw through a thermal-imaging lens, since that's their product. ▪️ Motor-G turned drone motors into pins. ▪️ Firepoint made dangler charms shaped after its own hardware. ▪️ A few stands went for humor: Hellwig & Lünenschloß GmbH camouflage rubber ducks, KNDS stress toys shaped like military vehicles. 🔵 Storytelling in details 🟰 In meetings with French partners, the Calibrated team gave out pins of the Borodianka rooster, the clay figurine that survived a Russian strike intact, with cards showing the wrecked apartment it stood in. The rooster is also a French national symbol, so the gift landed differently. More than one partner said it was staying on their desk. 🔵 Experience over demonstration ▪️ Oko Camera let visitors take an instant photo through its thermal lens. ▪️ SICH ran a tourniquet demo on a mannequin, some smeared with oil and fake blood, so people practiced the real mess of it. ▪️ Cinch Connectivity Solutions Ltd rubber-components manufacturer, built branded stress poppers filled with its own tech details. 🔵 Food and drink as a touchpoint ▪️Nutanix did branded M&Ms ▪️Habia, a cable manufacturer, handed out wire-shaped gummies. ▪️The Fourth Law and Odd Systems branded their chocolates directly. ▪️ Cascade Systems gave out drip coffee and xylitol drops. ▪️ Ark Robotics did cold brew. ▪️ Lithuania's stand served freeze-dried chocolate, made using their technology. The companies that got this right went beyond a logo. They translated their product, a value, or a moment of care into something someone chooses to keep. 🎁 What did you pick up at an industry event that impressed you? #Eurosatory2026 #DefenceTech #StrategicComms #BrandStrategy

It’s #WorldPRDay! AI was supposed to replace PR. Instead, it’s making good PR more valuable than ever. According to McKinsey’s latest State of the Consumer report, AI chatbots pull only 1-2% of what they say about a brand from the brand’s own channels. Even among the ten most-cited sources, a company’s own content rarely accounts for more than 10%. So where does the rest come from? ▪️ From earned media ▪️ From third-party voices ▪️ From consistent narratives built through years of public relations. McKinsey & Company calls the opposite signal dissonance.When different sources tell different stories about a brand, AI models get less accurate, or they stop mentioning the brand at all. The recommendations sound remarkably familiar to anyone working in PR: 🟰 Invest in earned media 🟰 Keep messaging consistent across channels 🟰 Be present in conversations beyond your own platforms These used to be the playbook for building trust with journalists and audiences. Now they build trust with AI too. For the defence, cybersecurity and cognitive security organisations we work with, this matters even more. Reputation isn’t created by refreshing a homepage or publishing another social media post. It’s built through credible, independent coverage and a narrative that remains consistent wherever both people and AI look. On World PR Day, it's worth remembering: AI didn't make PR less relevant. PR became part of how AI actually works. Strong communication is the input ➡️ I visibility is the output. Happy World PR Day to everyone shaping the conversations that both people and machines rely on 🙌 #WorldPRDay #PublicRelations #AI #Communications #Reputation

🇫🇮 Finland is one of Europe’s most important defence markets, but for foreign companies, success depends as much on trust and long-term relationships as it does on technology. Defender Media published a piece based on a session from the latest Defence Tech Comms Bootcamp, where Mikko-Pekka Hanski, Co-Founder of Double Tap Investments Ltd, shared his personal perspective on navigating the Finnish defence market and the opportunities available to Ukrainian defence tech companies. A few of the practical insights: 🟰 Win the technical user first. In Finland, procurement is driven by the people who will operate and maintain the system – trust from the technical user is often what drives broader institutional buy-in. 🟰 Match your approach to your technology’s maturity (TRL). Whether you should engage with the Finnish Defence Research Agency, PVINYX, or the Defence Forces Logistics Command depends on your Technology Readiness Level. Knowing your TRL is often more important than knowing the right person’s name. 🟰 Prove how your solution fits Finland’s defence system. Reputation alone won’t win contracts. Finnish users evaluate reliability, interoperability, maintenance requirements, and performance in temperatures below –25°C. 🔗 Read the full article for a deeper dive into Finland’s defence ecosystem: https://lnkd.in/dKGMHGjD 📌 If you wish to learn more about Finland and other European defence markets Defence Tech Bootcamp's recordings are available: https://lnkd.in/dTXCDvW8

New series alert: #WinsByCalibrated. Every quarter we'll share what moved for us, our clients, and the ecosystem around us. Q2 2026 first. 🎓 BOOTCAMP We ran our 4th Defence Tech Bootcamp: Go Global, May 11-15. Five days, four markets, plus a bonus session on Eurosatory. Thanks to our speakers: Mikko-Pekka Hanski, Tevje Ravn Eggan, 🇺🇦 Sigbjørn Albertsen, Laurent Macia, Vidmantas Vaitulevicius, Rokas Klioštoraitis, and Louis-Marie Le Béon. Helsing made this edition possible as a strategic sponsor. Supported by Ukrainian Council of Defence Industry - Рада Зброярів, Techosystem, IRON Cluster and media partners Militarnyi, Defender Media, and Startup Kitchen. 🤝 PARTNERSHIPS We were information partners at three major defence events. The Global Forum on FIMI & Hybrid Threats with Osavul, DISARM Foundation, and Center for the Study of Democracy. Kyiv Defense Tech Week, brought together by Invest in Bravery and European Defense Tech Hub. DIH Naval Forge with Defense Innovation Highway | DIH. 📰 MEDIA Our clients picked up coverage across Forbes Ukraine, Resilience Media, Business Ukraine Magazine, Euromaidan Press, Defender Media, The Kyiv Independent, NV, UKRINFORM, National Today, Arsenal Europe Ukraine, Defense Express, Grupa Wirtualna Polska, Militarnyi, Liga.net, Defence24, УНІАН, 24 Канал, AIN, The Kyiv Independent, Інтер, ICTV (International Commercial Television), Громадське радіо and Suspilne Ukraine. We got featured too. 🟰 Business Ukraine Magazine ran a piece on Calibrated and a cyber resilience article: https://lnkd.in/d2HFaaCm 🟰Defender Media published a co-founder's column on defence exports: https://lnkd.in/dQB4hPGx 🟰Militarnyi covered our Bootcamp Eurosatory prep insights: https://lnkd.in/d7VxsM9i ✈️ EUROSATORY We were on the ground at Eurosatory 2026, June 15-19, running strategic meetings and client showcases, putting into practice what our own Bootcamp speakers taught months earlier. 🎤 SPEAKING Olha Danchenkova, our co-founder and CCO delivered a lecture at the NATO Defense College in Rome and led seminar discussions for three working groups of the NATO Regional Cooperation Course Julia Petryk, our co-founder and CEO, spoke at BledCom International Public Relations Symposium 2026 on crisis communication lessons from Ukraine, in the session "When Reality Breaks the Playbook: Crisis Communication Lessons from Ukraine." 🏆 RECOGNITION Calibrated team got nominated for a Women in Defence UK Award in the International category. Thanks to our team, clients, and partners for the trust and the work. Grateful for what we get to do and the recognition that came with it. More coming in Q3! #WinsByCalibrated

🇫🇷 The Calibrated team is back from Paris. Eurosatory 2026 was a real whirlwind. Ukrainian defence companies arrived in Paris not as newcomers, but as providers of battlefield-tested technologies that European procurement officials, prime contractors, and alliance partners are actively looking for. Over five intense days, we watched Ukrainian teams hold strategic meetings, showcase their solutions, launch new partnerships, and move procurement conversations forward. A special thank you to the Eurosatory team and COGES EVENTS for hosting such an important gathering of the global defence ecosystem. Particular thanks to Louis-Marie Le Béon. Earlier this year, he joined our Defence Tech Bootcamp: Go Global by Calibrated and shared practical insights on navigating international defence exhibitions. It was rewarding to see many of those lessons reflected in how Ukrainian companies prepared, showed up, and engaged throughout the week. 🙌 It was exciting to meet our clients in Paris. Looking forward to continuing the conversations that started in Paris.  #Eurosatory2026

If you are attending BledCom 2026, there is a session on crisis communication worth adding to your schedule. Julia Petryk, CEO and co-founder of Calibrated, will speak at "When Reality Breaks the Playbook: Crisis Communication Lessons from Ukraine." 🗓️27 June, 12:00 PM, Parallel Paper Sessions 7, Block C, Bled, Slovenia. BledCom International Public Relations Symposium is the leading international symposium on public relations and strategic communication, bringing together researchers, communication leaders, and practitioners from around the world. The session draws on four years of operating and building a business during Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, where many established crisis communication frameworks, protocols, and response playbooks proved insufficient when organizations faced the most devastating crisis there is: war. During Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, teams had to navigate missile attacks, infrastructure blackouts, cyberattacks, disinformation campaigns, and critical decisions made under constant uncertainty and pressure. It explores what it takes to communicate, lead, and maintain organizational resilience when crises are not isolated events but an everyday reality. #BledCom2026 #CrisisComms #StrategicCommunications #Resilience

🖥️ In cybersecurity, staying informed is part of the defence posture. Cyberattacks from hostile states rank as the top security concern across G7 publics, per the Munich Security Report 2026. 73% of security leaders surveyed across 92 countries reported being personally affected by cyber-enabled fraud, per the WEF Global Cybersecurity Outlook 2026. 🎧 Here’s a Part 1 of curated list of cybersecurity podcasts worth adding to your queue: 🟰 CyberWire Daily by N2K | CyberWire – daily cybersecurity news and analysis, published every weekday with expert interviews across industry, academia, and research. Host Dave Bittner. https://lnkd.in/gDcS9_T 🟰 Click Here by The Record from Recorded Future News – investigative storytelling on ransomware, disinformation campaigns, and the people on both sides. Host Dina Temple-Raston. https://lnkd.in/duVQpSb7 🟰 CISO Series – practitioner-led discussions between security executives and vendors. What works, what doesn't, and why. Hosts David Spark, Mike Johnson, and Andy Ellis. https://lnkd.in/gXDeUuki 🟰 Cyber Focus by McCrary Institute for Cyber & Critical Infrastructure Security – senior cybersecurity voices on what public and private organisations need to do to stay secure. Host Frank Cilluffo. https://lnkd.in/gB6Rw79r 🟰 CISO Perspectives – strategies and technologies senior cybersecurity executives navigate daily. Host Kim Jones. https://lnkd.in/daW47Ci 🟰 8th Layer Insights – how human behaviour shapes security outcomes. Psychology, behaviour science, and communication in the security context. Host Perry Carpenter. https://lnkd.in/dyPftAR 🟰 Cyber Defence Radio – broad cybersecurity coverage from a recognised industry voice. Host Gary Miliefsky,Cyber Defense Magazine. https://lnkd.in/eBYnCQ5h 🟰 Daily Stormcast by SANS Technology Institute – five minutes each weekday on current network security events. Concise, educational, listener-driven. Host Dr. Johannes Ullrich. https://lnkd.in/gEdxvmb 🟰 Berlin Security Beat by Hertie School– international security careers and the cyber-geopolitics intersection. Useful for those tracking where policy and technology meet. https://lnkd.in/gNgDtNEj 🟰 Breaking into Cybersecurity – career transitions, workforce development, and building the next generation of cyber leadership. Hosts ‘Christophe Foulon and Renee Small. https://lnkd.in/eah3hBmz ⬇️ Leave a comment if you already follow any of these, or which podcast you'd add to the list. #ListByCalibrated #Cybersecurity #DefenceTech #CyberPodcast

300+ participants from 20+ countries – the first event of its kind built around unmanned maritime systems and naval logistics protection. Defense Innovation Highway | DIH Naval Forge 2026 wrapped in Kyiv on June 8-9. Calibrated was happy to provide information support for this event. We're glad to support discussions of this calibre. They build the kind of cooperation that moves innovation and security forward. The forum highlighted some of the most important developments shaping the future of maritime security, with discussions focused on innovative defence technologies, unmanned naval systems, logistics protection, defence-industrial cooperation, joint R&D, and the rapid integration of battlefield-proven solutions into operational capabilities. What made the event particularly valuable was its combination of strategic dialogue and practical demonstrations, creating direct connections between operational military experience, industry expertise, and international partners. The live testing and demonstration of next-generation maritime systems reinforced Ukraine's role as a driving force in the evolution of modern naval warfare. Up to 20 Ukrainian unmanned maritime companies ran live trials near Kyiv. Norwegian company Maritime Robotics AS demonstrated its autonomous vessel, then donated it to a frontline Ukrainian unit on the spot. Our thanks to the organising team: Defense Innovation Highway | DIH, Unmanned Naval Association, and the Department of Innovative Activities of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Special thanks to Iryna Supruniuk and Esben Gadsbøll from DIH for their warm partnership, collaboration, and dedication to strengthening Nordic–Ukrainian defence cooperation. #DIHNavalForge #DefenceTech #MaritimeSecurity #Ukraine #NordicCooperation

❗ Disinformation is one of the top business risks in 2026. According to the Allianz Political Violence and Civil Unrest Report 2026, 34% of risk managers, CFOs, and executives worldwide place disinformation campaigns in the same strategic risk category as war, civil unrest, terrorism, and state intervention. This reflects a shift that has been building for years. Threat actors are increasingly blending disinformation, cyber operations, criminal activity, and political violence into coordinated campaigns designed to disrupt operations, influence decision-making, and undermine trust while remaining difficult to attribute. The broader context is the gray zone. Since 2022, Europe has experienced sabotage campaigns, cyber escalation, and coordinated information pressure occurring simultaneously and often relying on the same underlying infrastructure. Ukraine has been operating inside this environment for years. Communication readiness is no longer a reputational asset. It is part of organizational resilience. Source: Allianz Commercial, Political Violence & Civil Unrest Trends 2026 #NumbersByCalibrated #CognitiveSecurity #HybridThreats #CorporateResilience #DisinformationRisk

Most companies lose media opportunities at events because of poor preparation. 🗓️ The calendar is packed: Eurosatory, Resilience Media Conference, European Defence Innovation Forum, BRAVE1 Defense Tech Valley and a string of forums, summits, and defence expos running through the rest of the year. Each one is an opportunity to connect with the journalists  who actually shape conversations in this sector. As a strategic communications agency we often see that preparation remains the area where most organisations underinvest. That's why we put together a practical checklist covering three stages: • Preparation before the event • Media engagement on-site • Follow-up after the event 📌 Save this for your next event and share it with the people involved in event attendance preparation. If you'd like to go deeper, Calibrated works with defence tech, cybersecurity, and cognitive security organisations on strategic communications by helping them build visibility with the right audiences, and turn event presence into lasting coverage and relationships. ✉️ Drop us a message or meet us at Eurosatory next week.