Honeywell supplied its Garrett TPE331 (military designation: T76) turboprop engines for HAL’s HTT-40 training aircraft program, these engine is manufactured in India
Gearing to tap the n ext wave of opportunity in Indian defence sector
US software-industrial conglomerate Honeywell is working on finalising a couple of collaborations with Indian companies for the local production of defence technologies.
The company, which has been working with defence PSU Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) for more than four decades, is looking at new partnerships on the lines of its tie-up with TATA Power’s Strategic Engineering Division for domestic inertial land navigation systems.
The decision to look for more partnerships comes in the wake of growing demand for its technology in new aircraft platforms for the Indian defence.
“We are looking at a few collaborative efforts. Presently, we are working with a couple of partners, about whom you will hear very soon,” Neelu Khatri, President-Aerospace, Honeywell International (I) Pvt Ltd told BusinessLine.
High-Priority Market
She said that for Honeywell, India is a very high priority market and the company would enter into local partnerships whenever the need arose.
“We saw there was a big need for making inertial navigation system and hence we partnered with TATA. The ‘made in India’ Akash missile had Honeywell’s inertial navigation system,” she added.
Honeywell, a popular aero-engine maker, will continue to invest heavily in India over the next 4-5 years as the company is gearing up to tap the next wave of opportunity in the Indian defence sector.
“We are very happy with the current policies of ‘Make in India’. We took some steps at a good time and now we can leverage the relationships and the footprint that we have created,” said Khatri.
Almost all global businesses of Honeywell have presence in India and the company employs more than 16,000 people; and it has three technology centres and seven manufacturing facilities.
Its aerospace engineers’ strength alone is about 3,500. The company’s domestic sales and exports exceed ₹7,000 crore per year.
Honeywell supplied its engines for HAL’s recent HTT-40 aircraft program. The testing phase is on with Honeywell’s engines in the aircraft. Its TPE331 engine is manufactured in India.