GUP Konstruktorskoye Buro Priborostroyeniya (GUP KBP, State Unitary Enterprise Instrument Design Bureau) is the leader in the development and production of precision weapons systems.
GUP KBP (previously TsKB-14, Central Design Bureau No. 14) opened on October 1, 1927. The design bureau was assigned tasks associated with the overhaul of the entire small arms weapons system of the Red Army. In 1966, TsKB-14 was re-named the Instrument Design Bureau, and in 1992 it came to be called the State Unitary Enterprise Instrument Design Bureau.
In 1998, GUP KBP was incorporated as a branch in the state unitary enterprise Central Small Arms Design Research Bureau.
In its 80 years, the GUP KBP has become a leader in the Russian Federation's defence industry. The bureau's team has developed, mass-produced and furnished more than 130 highly-effective weapons and military hardware for the armament of the Russian Army.
Many of KBP's designs became world famous - the TT, PM and APS pistols, the ShKAS and BS aircraft machine guns. KBP is considered to be the home of the A-12,7 aircraft machine guns, the AM-23 aircraft gun, the 2А7 and 2А14 anti-aircraft machine guns, and the ZU-23 anti-aircraft mount. The PM pistol is listed in Guinness World Records as the most mass-produced pistol in the entire history of this class of weapon. The designs of Fyodor Tokarev, Mikhail Berezin, Alexander Volkov, Sergei Yartsev, Nikolai Afanasiev, Nikolai Makarov, Igor Stechkin, Rudolf Purtsen and others have made the company world famous.
The company continues to develop new armaments. The more well-known GUP KBP designs include the Kornet anti-tank weapons system; the Krasnopol and Kitolov artillery precision guided munitions; the Drozd active protection system; the Tunguska, Kashtan and Pantsir gun-missile integrated air defence weapons systems; the Shmel rocket infantry flame-thrower; the AGS-30 automatic grenade launcher system and the GSh-18 pistol.
Many of these designs surpass the performance characteristics of similar non-Russian weapons, and often have no equivalents anywhere in the world.
As part of a programme to convert defence sector industries to civilian applications, the company is developing medical laser equipment.
The company operates a training centre, where intensive training of young professionals takes place using seven departments at Tula State University.
The high technological level of the products and the organisation of their mass production at companies and plants in the defence sector have allowed GUP KBP to successfully compete in the global weapons market.