India has signed a Rs 1,943 crore, 30-month contract with General Atomics to lease two MQ-9B Sea Guardian aircraft for the Navy, adding surveillance capacity in the Indian Ocean Region ahead of a larger planned MQ-9B fleet.
Larsen & Toubro and France-based Exail have partnered to provide an unmanned mine counter-measure suite for the Indian Navy’s planned fleet of 12 Mine Counter Measure Vessels. The companies will offer autonomous and remotely operated systems designed to detect and neutralise naval mines.
Larsen & Toubro and General Atomics-ASI have signed a partnership to manufacture Medium Altitude Long Endurance drones in India for the armed forces, with L&T as prime bidder and GA-ASI as technology partner under the Ministry of Defence’s 87-MALE RPAS programme.
Also noteworthy will be the Exocet anti-ship missile, with the SM39 submarine variant already delivered for the Indian Navy’s Scorpene submarines.
These Contractor Sea Trials will be conducted over the next few months and the Vikrant is expected to be commissioned in the first half of 2022. The navy says the ship’s performance, including hull, main propulsion, PGD and auxiliary equipment would be closely monitored during this maiden sailing.
United Shipbuilding Corporation design bureau Rubin is offering the Amur 1650 submarine with AIP in partnership with Larsen & Toubro for the Indian Navy’s P75(I) program for six submarines.
US defense systems manufacturer Raytheon plans to exhibit a wide range of products and programs in the areas of Intelligence, Surveillance And Reconnaissance (ISR), Command, Control And Communications (C3), integrated air & missile defense, missile systems, radar and homeland security (including coastal/maritime security), at Aero India 2011 in Bangalore next week.
Vivek Lall, head of Boeing’s defense unit in India, talks about how growing US-India relations have helped Boeing’s prospects, in a wide-ranging conversation.
