Rs 50,000 crore defence business in offing: DRDO official

Kochi, July 26 (UNI) Business opportunities to the tune of Rs 50,000 crore are in the offing for Indian industries with the growth of indigenous defence systems, a senior Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) official said today.

Addressing a 'Defence-Industry Convergence Seminar' here, Naval Physical and Oceanographic Laboratory (NPOL) Director S Ananthan Narayanan said an estimated business of 10 to 15 billion US dollars was in the offing for both public and private industries from the defence sector in the country in the coming years.

Urging the private sector companies to take full advantage of this huge opportunity, Mr Narayanan proposed that 'defence industrial complexes' be set up at places like Kerala, which had abundant knowledge intensive manpower, raw materials, financial institutions and resources.

''With ISRO on one side and three international airports in the state and the southern Air Command in Tiruvananthapuram, the prospect of the aerospace industry was very promising for Kerala,'' he said.

On successful DRDO's 'Brahmos' joint venture with Russian company NPOM Mashinostryenia, Mr Narayanan said the venture had produced highly technological intensive 'Bramhos' supersonic missile in the country.

Stating that the future of the defence industry was bright, he suggested areas such as manufacture of aerospace and defence components and systems, avionics, military electronics, mission computers, software, materials and structures as potential areas to set up 'defence industry complexes'.

Observing that defence and aerospace industries were currently concentrated in Bangalore, Hyderabad, Visakhapatnam and Mumbai, he said with the huge business potential available, other areas should be identified and groomed for this sector.

UNI