Saab, Adani to partner to build single-engine fighter jets in India - consultant

By Aditya Kalra

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Sweden's Saab will tie up with India's Adani Group to bid for a contract to make fighter aircrafts in India, an aerospace consultant aware of the proposed partnership told Reuters on Thursday.

The partnership will compete with U.S. defence giant Lockheed Martin in a two horse-race to equip the Indian military with single-engine jets to be produced locally under Prime Minister Narendra Modi's "Make-in-India" initiative.

The Saab-Adani partnership is aimed at producing planes under India's new "strategic partnership" policy, said Ratan Shrivastava, the independent New-Delhi-based consultant and adviser at India's industry lobby group FICCI said.

The partnership will likely be announced on Friday, Shrivastava said.

Saab President and Chief Executive Hakan Buskhe will host a media event in New Delhi on Friday, Saab said in a press invitation issued on Wednesday. It did not give details.

Saab did not immediately respond to a request for comment. There was no immediate comment from Adani, which is a $12 billion group with businesses ranging from energy and logistics to real estate and defence.

Under the country's new defence partnership policy, a foreign aircraft maker will collaborate with an Indian firm to develop a world-class indigenous aeronautical base that India has struggled to build for decades.

Lockheed has already picked India's Tata Advanced Systems as its local partner to produce its F-16 fighter planes that will compete with Saab's Gripen aircraft.

The government will issue a formal request to Lockheed and Saab over the next few days to provide information about their plans to design, develop and produce combat jets in India, a government official told Reuters earlier this week.

India's air force needs hundreds of aircraft to replace its Soviet-era fleet, but Modi wants the planes built in India to help boost the domestic industrial base and cut imports.

(Additional reporting by Aditi Shah and Nidhi Verma; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani and Neil Fullick)