BAE Systems chief: Britain should stay in EU Mr King was speaking at a meeting to showcase the commercial potential of the defence giant's cyber security arm, which is being re-named from Detica to BAE Applied Intelligence. But he was also quizzed on whether BAE had drawn up a contingency plan for what would happen if Scotland voted for independence on September 18. The defence giant sparked an outcry in November when it announced it was calling time on 500 years of shipbuilding history in Portsmouth and would focus its activity at its two Scottish shipyards, Govan and Scotstoun, as part of a restructuring of its naval business. The decision was seen as a victory for SNP leader Alex Salmond. Mr King admitted the company had "no contingency plans" to deal with a "yes" vote and all of the company's capability for building complex warships exists north of the Border. "If Scotland becomes independent...then we will have to have a discussion with our customer, the Westminster Government, about how they would like to deal with that," he said. Mr King stressed BAE has good "momentum" despite recently failing to secure a multi-billion pound deal with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) over some 60 Eurofighter Typhoon jets. He insisted the aircraft had met the UAE's "very exacting requirements" but the deal failed due to "budget considerations." He defended: "This aircraft is a superb aircraft. This [decision by the UAE] does not impact our ability to sell to other countries. He added that BAE never put the UAE deal in its business plan. BAE is currently in "fairly intense" discussions with Saudi Arabia over the pricing of Typhoon jets, Mr King said, while it is also making significant progress at its cyber security arm, which is experiencing "double digit" growth due to strong interest from companies. "Over the last 18 months to two years, the ability to get access to the board of a company to talk about cyber security has changed beyond all recognition," said Martin Sutherland, managing director of BAE Systems Detica. Mr King's comments on Britain's membership of the EU follow just a day after Unilever chief executive, Paul Polman, said it is "better to be part of than against" Europe. The BBA has also this week told the Treasury that there is an "overwhelming" case for Britain to devote more resources to improve its representation in Europe. The Prime Minister has said he will hold a referendum on Britain's membership of the EU in 2017 unless the UK can negotiate better terms.