Close on the heels of the Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (ADAG) foraying into the defence sector, the Gujarat-based Adani Group, on Wednesday, announced signing of the Statement of Intent to work together with Israel’s Elbit-ISTAR and India’s Alpha Design Technologies Pvt Ltd in the field of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) in India.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is currently on a three-nation tour, including Saudi Arabia, is likely to visit Israel this year, becoming the first Indian PM to do so.
Anil Ambani's Reliance Defence has formed a joint venture with Israel’s Rafael Advanced Systems for development of air-to-air missiles for the Indian Air Force (IAF).
Adani Aero Defence Systems and Technologies Ltd will explore opportunities in UAS. These firms will create a tiered vendor base for supporting indigenisation and localisation requirements and will seek to set up a final India-based assembly and integration line, including MRO facilities, by incorporating transfer of technology for supporting the product range, during its lifecycle, an Adani Group spokesman said here.
UAS are the next frontier of technology providing multi-functional capability especially, that of seeing and hearing, to provide information advantage to the war fighters and net security providers.
The statement of intent reflects firm commitment of companies to realise the dream of “Make in India” for global requirements, he said.
Adani Aero Defence Systems is a fully-owned subsidiary of the group flagship Adani Enterprises, with interest in design, technology development, technical collaboration, system integration services for aerospace and defence equipment and systems.
With revenues of over $10 billion, the Adani Group is a global integrated infrastructure player with businesses across resources, logistics, energy and agro.
Elbit Systems Ltd is a high technology company engaged in a wide range of defence, homeland security and commercial programs worldwide.
Elbit Systems shares are traded on the Nasdaq National Market (NASDAQ) and on the Tel-Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE).
Alpha Design Technologies specialises in design, development and production of defence electronics and avionics equipment and systems, airframes, upgradation of cockpits, opto-electronics, thermal imager-based fire control systems, communications, including SDR, EW and microwave systems, software, indigenisation and obsolescence management in defence systems.