AVIATION NEWS                                      Back To Index Page
Dec 2006

US eyes Indian aerospeace market

     New Delhi: The US companies are eyeing the Indian Defence and Aerospace market to expand and promote their business. "We are anxious to do business with India and want to gain better understanding of the Indian Aerospace and Defence markets and various procurement policies," said Executive Vice President, Defence and International Affairs, Aerospace Industries Association (AIA), Mark Esper, at the first-ever trade mission of the American group to India, organised by Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) on Monday. Esper said AIA represents US' major Aerospace and Defence manufacturers and is the country's premier trade association. The AIA team, comprising of 30 representatives, is on a six-day visit to India and would meet various Indian Defence and Commerce officials. "Our 2007 agenda includes promoting the development of modern export control system," said Esper.

     Director of the Centre for Air Power Studies, Air Cmde (retd) Jasjit Singh, said India needs to modernise its Defence system fast. "We are facing several challenges: China's military is already modernised. They have a Russian-designed system. While we have 80 percent Defence products sourced from Russia, it's time we diversified and got into new partnerships." He said, "Already, the aerospace balance is in China's favour. The Indian Air Force needs to become a more strategic force." He added that in the next 20 years, change is required in three areas - finance, technology and reliability of supplies. The last, he said, was crucial to strengthen the defence system of the country. "The defence-aerospace market in India is around eight billion dollars. We need a quicker, more rational and faster model of transformation. We need to energise the aerospace industry, which the CII is attempting to do," he declared. He emphasised that the Indian and American private industry have worked as partners earlier also to build fighter aircraft. Before the plenary session, the AIA delegation was briefed by the CII on Defence procurement procedures; Indian Offset Policy; and the role of software technology in the aviation industry. India has been opening to the US Aerospace products in the last decade. The two countries have signed a Defence pact in 2005. Kaustubh Shukla, Chairman CII Defence Sub-Committee on Aviation and Avionics, said on Monday that CII has provided industry representatives from the two countries a platform to forge business partnerships.
-Dec 4, 2006