Russia’s newest Arctic artillery complex, called “Magnolia,” has begun mass production.

Magnolia’s development was first announced in 2017, with its technical details revealed in late 2019 when Russian Army Commander-in-Chief Army General Oleg Salyukov said in an interview that Russia was wrapping up work on its Nabrosok experimental design, which would develop a family of highly mobile artillery and mortar armaments mounted on various types of chassis. Two years later, the state-owned Uralvagonzavod defense manufacturer confirmed the timeline for the mass production of the next-generation Russian artilleries at the Army-2021 International Military-Technical Forum.

“The mass production of these models [the Floks and Magnolia artilleries] will begin after the completion of the state trials in late 2022 – early 2023, provided that the state customer makes the corresponding decision,” the Uralvagonzavod press office said.

During the forum, prototypes of the Magnolia were displayed alongside another recent Russian war machine, the Floks self-propelled wheeled artillery system. At that time, both of these prototypes were at their final stage of preliminary trials.