Defence Business: India, U.S. To Chalk Out Roadmap For Collaboration

During the meeting, the two sides will discuss various initiatives, including the 'Cheel' project to manufacture unmanned aircraft system.

A senior defence department official said the 'Cheel' project is expected to be the quickest one, with the two countries likely to announce this week setting up of a small working group to "develop a business model" to move forward with co-development and co-production of the mini-Raven.

While the Lockheed Martin's 'Roll On and Roll Off Kits' project for C-130s and other aviation platforms project could be seen entering phase of developing a business plan by year end, Pentagon officials hoped that India will finally join it on two other projects of developing mobile electric hydro power source and next generation chemical biological protection suit.

"I see this (joint working group) as a significant first step to fulfilling the vision under DTTI (Defence Trade and Technology Initiative), which is this joint government and industrials relationship to mutually develop capability and put that capability into production," a senior Defence Department official told PTI.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, described these projects as "a proof of concept" which would serve as a significant pathfinder and eventually lead to co-development and co-production of projects of much higher technologies.

A joint venture between India's Dynamatic Technologies and AeroVironment of the U.S., the 'Cheel' project to develop the next-generation unmanned aircraft system is a very promising one, and has a lot of export potential, the official said.

"The project is very mature...what we need is to secure Indian interest moving forward," he said.

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