Tamil Nadu to come up with new aerospace policy to attract investments

Tidco to set up Aerospace and Defence Park at Chennai

Tamil Nadu is set to come out with a new policy to attract aerospace manufacturing industries to the state.

The state has managed to attract around Rs 1,500 crore for the upcoming aerospace components manufacturing park, which will spread over 250 acres at Sriperumbudur near here.

Speaking on the sidelines of the 6th edition of Tamil Nadu Manufacturing Summit organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), B Elangovan, general manager of  Tamil Nadu Industrial Development Corporation (Tidco) said the state wished to create a complete ecosystem and infrastructure to attract investments in this sector besides introducing a new policy.

“In ten years from now, we want to manufacture aircraft in the state,” said Elangovan.

He said the state had to compete with Karnataka, which has a strong presence in the aerospace industry. Bangalore- Chennai- Hyderabad is considered as the aerospace hub in India with its strong ecosystem in place for attracting investments.

Tamil Nadu has made plans for setting up a maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) facility spread in 50 acres in Meenambakkam. “The TEFS study was completed for creating aeroparks in multiple locations in the state and an exclusive policy is in the anvil for aerospace industries,” he said.

Eight companies with investment commitments for Rs 1,500 crore have been allocated space inside the park, while seven more companies would submit proposals and 10 companies had shown interest.

Tidco is expecting major original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and more than 50 companies to set up shops in the park by 2015-end, said Elangovan. These companies are largely SMEs and the park will have a design centre, common testing and training facilities, aero complex, centre of excellence, warehouse and composite development centres.

To a question on the global aviation major Boeing evincing interest in the state, he said the company was evaluating various locations in the country and Tamil Nadu was one among them.

Globally, aerospace industry is estimated to be around $1 trillion and is growing at an annual 3-4 per cent. However, the Indian domestic aerospace market is expected grow over 10 per cent. The country is expected to procure more than 4,500 different kinds of aircraft worth $ 130 billion over the next 20 years to augment its over 1,100 fleet. An estimated $ 20 billion would be invested in the airport infrastructure and around $30-35 billion would be spent on defence aircraft procurement over next 10 years.

It is learnt the OEMs had increasingly been shifting their bases to other locations, especially Asia, led by availability of the low-cost labour in India.