Dassault Aviation and Tata Technologies sign MoU for MMRCA offsets

London, Pune, India and Detroit: Dassault Aviation and INCAT's parent company, Tata Technologies, have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for Engineering Services Outsourcing (ESO), services. Under the terms of the MoU, INCAT will provide Dassault Aviation with engineering services in a number of critical domains in support of the Indian Air Force's 126 fighter multi-role medium range combat aircraft (MMRCA) programme.

The programme involves significant industrial offset requirements, up to 50 per cent.

While the bulk of the services will be delivered mostly from the recently established joint venture INCAT HAL Aerostructures Ltd (IHAL) and its dedicated aerospace ESO centre in Bangalore, some others will be supplied through INCAT's delivery teams in France and the US.

The joint venture will be the Preferred Delivery Centre for both organizations with both HAL and Tata Technologies 50 per cent partners in the venture.

M. Fakruddin, Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd's, director, corporate planning and marketing, said "the objective of this joint venture is to undertake work packages related to engineering design services in aerostructures, and also the captive offshore and on-site work load of both partners from aerospace OEMs, including offset programmes."

Founded in 1989, INCAT is a Tata Technologies company providing services in product lifecycle management, enterprise resource management and application development and maintenance.

The company is headquartered in Novi, Michigan, Pune and Stuttgart.

The agreement testifies INCAT's expertise in the aerospace market. Eric Trappier, executive vice-president international of Dassault Aviation says: "It is essential to find partners with the right expertise and experience in both aerospace engineering and working in India. INCAT and Tata Technologies have proven credentials in both these areas."

Lokesh Srivastava, CEO of IHAL, comments: "This MoU marks a significant milestone since the formation of IHAL and is a sure sign of the solid demand for our services."

As for Dassault Aviation it has delivered more than 7500 civil and military aircraft to 75 countries logging some 20 million flight hours to date over the past sixty years

Dassault Aviation's association with India is itself half a century old. From the Toofani fighters supplied in the 1950's to the Mystere IV, the Jaguar manufactured under licence by HAL, to the Mirage 2000 it has been a rich relationship.