US, India learn from co-development fiasco, approach DTTI differently

There are few takers for this, however, given the abandonment of projects taken up earlier, and their replacement with seven new co-development projects on Thursday

The US-India agreement on Thursday to co-develop seven cutting-edge defence systems marks the formal burial of six co-development projects announced with fanfare in 2015, but never concluded.

The agreement marks the reorientation of the US-India Defence Technology and Trade Initiative (DTTI) from a narrow, government-focused approach, to a new realisation that joint development projects be piloted by defence industry on both sides, while the Pentagon and India’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) oversee progress and deals with regulatory roadblocks that arise.

US Under Secretary of Defense, Ellen Lord, who visited Delhi this week to co-chair the ninth DTTI meeting with her