Samtel to produce avionics for fighter planes

Venturing into the Indian defence market, electronic display panel maker Samtel today announced plans to manufacture highly sophisticated cockpit helmet mounted displays and other avionics for fighter aircraft. The Delhi-based company, which has a manufacturing unit in Germany, signed a joint venture agreement with European defence and aerospace company Thales at a proposed initial investment of Rs 60 crore in next three years.

The new joint venture, in which Samtel will hold a 74 per cent stake, proposes to bid for mounting of these specialised helmet pilot displays for the proposed upgrade of the Indian Airforce's frontline Mirage 2000 Fighters. The company's bid to float a joint venture comes after the government last week announced a 1 billion euro project to upgrade IAF's 51 Mirage fighters to the level of those flying with the French Airforce.

Samtel and Thales are already joint partners for supply of similar head mounted sight and display for Indian Navy's soon-to-be-acquired carrier borne MIG 29K fighters. Though the Mirage upgrade deal is still to be finalised, according to Thales vice-president Francois Quentin, the first four Mirages would be upgraded in France and the rest 47 in India by creating special facilities at Bangalore-based Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd.

"In the upgrades the entire airframe of the Mirages would be stripped down and re-equipped with the advanced radars avionics and weapon delivery system," Quentin said. He said the upgrades would enhance the life of the Fighters by 20-30 years. The French company official said the deal is expected to be signed in the next three to four months and the first of the upgraded Mirages delivered to the IAF by 2011. The French company also has 30 per cent of its systems on-board the new Dassault Fighters Rafale, which are in contention for India's biggest ever global tenders worth 10 billion dollars for purchase of 126 multi-role combat aircraft.

Samtel Chairman Satish Kaura said his company planned to develop avionics capability in depth to meet IAF's requirement. The company is collaborating with IAF for installing major avionics system for the Russian acquired SU-30MKI.