The Indian Aerospace and defence manufacturing industry is one of the significant sectors for the economy

The recent policy announcements pertaining to UDAN, airport modernization and MRO (maintenance, repair and operations) will help Indian companies from large enterprise to SMEs. There is a clear indication that government is willing to invest into these sectors – be it operationalizing 108 ports by 2025 or be it working towards making India as a MRO hub. These initiatives are really helping India to evolve as a manufacturing hub in aerospace and defence. “A vibrant aerospace & defence manufacturing base, through increased indigenization, will provide impetus to “Make in India” and “Aatmanirbhar Bharat”, creating employment, self-reliance, and geopolitical stability,” Deepak NG, Managing Director, India, Dassault Systemes.

Following are excerpts of Deepak NG, Managing Director, India, Dassault Systemes’ conversation with Huma Siddiqui at Aero-India 2021

The Indian Aerospace and defence manufacturing industry is one of the significant sectors for the economy. We are already witnessing great opportunity for both domestic and global players with new policies and increased FDI. The industry is likely to accelerate with rising demands, not only to meet domestic needs but also to cater to international market. The Indian government has set the defence production target at US$ 25.00 billion by 2025 (including US$ 5 billion from exports by 2025) Now to achieve this modernization is required, mainly to focus on cost, time and quality. Government is going to look at all three aspects, we being associated with A&D industry in India we are witnessing strong push from government to promote SMEs, Public sector undertakings and start-ups. This will enable the domestic industry to benefit in areas of design, innovation and manufacturing, all critical for the economy.

Fuelling transformation of the supply chain in the industry through effective digitalization via cloud. How does your company plan to do this?

After almost a year of facing unprecedented disruptions and challenges with grit and resilience, like other industry; the Aerospace and Defence (A&D) industry will also look at lessons learnt in 2020 and aim to get back on track in 2021. This will mandate OEMs and suppliers to accelerate innovation, drive efficiencies and move to the factory of the future to achieve greater agility and efficiency.

Despite the closer collaboration between OEMs and suppliers, already the hundreds of suppliers who provide all of the components and subsystems needed to assemble final product are looking at how to enhance or leverage state of the art technology to create greater value network. With raising demand many of the industry’s supply chains will be challenged to keep up with the pace of production that will be required for OEMs to avoid production glitches and meet their commitments to deliver on schedule.

Orchestrating global supply chains has greatly increased the complexity of managing teams of contractors. The large companies who do final assembly could do a much better job of synchronizing these networks of companies and be more transparent with information. Greater supplier collaboration and real-time visibility on the delivery and quality of more complete multi-discipline systems would enable OEMs to extract valuable insights into upstream and downstream supply chain processes, further drive integration to improve decision-making and optimize planning and execution.

We are fuelling the transformation of the supply chain in the industry through effective digitalization via cloud, which enables our customers to collaborate and design in a better and faster way. A fully developed and evolved supply chain ecosystem can help the industry break new grounds in its larger goal of Make in India. It means, the full utilization of the potential of virtual twins and application of model based systems engineering (MBSE) in the development of new aircrafts, new defence systems or next generation of commercial and defence ready drones.

Today, supplier-created parts and content represents 50-60 per cent of the value of an aerospace system. Relentless price pressures are compelling aircraft manufacturers and suppliers to reinvent the way they work with the supply chain. The new model requires a closer partnership to improve visibility, on-time delivery and first-time quality. The Program Excellence Industry Solution Experience based on the 3DEXPERIENCE platform enables companies to optimize their product strategy and reach high level of efficiency in program execution. Companies can implement their digital transformation around governance, configuration, collaboration and analytics. The Engineered to Fly Industry Solution Experience based on the 3DEXPERIENCE platform from Dassault Systemes helps suppliers win more business and more efficiently deliver on time, on budget, on target. Best in class engineering, simulation and project tools delivered on a single platform can improve productivity up to 40 per cent while reducing total cost of ownership at least 15 per cent.

Key technologies (Industry Solution Experiences) from Dassault Systemes that can fuel the A&D development graph in India?

With the theme of showcasing ‘Digitalization to realize a thriving Aerospace, Defence and Space ecosystem, Dassault Systemes at the 13th edition of Aero India 2021 will be showcasing technology solutions to Improve Supply Chain Collaboration, to Design for Flexible Manufacturing, to Manage Complex Systems and Accelerate Program Integration and to Deliver High Performance Operations. At our booth in A6.6 & A6.8 our experts will discuss with the industry players and suppliers on how to bridge the gap between the virtual and real world to accelerate concept to operations by 50 per cent through industry solution experiences (ISE) based on the 3DEXPERIENCE platform. Industry leaders will get an opportunity at our booth to explore more on how global and domestic players are benefited by leveraging 3DEXPERIENCE Platform.

How is Dassault planning to help India in achieving Atmanirbhar Bharat in the A&D sector?

There are different ways Dassault Systemes in India addresses the A&D sector that helps in achieving self-reliance in the sector. We work with leading DPSUs in military aerospace. We work the entire ecosystem of A&D; in indigenous development of military aircrafts, components. We work in the civil aerospace in the indigenous development of regional transport vehicles, and programs in defence manufacturing (PSUs & SMEs) and defence R&D. The company is also working in space programs, with private space companies and start-ups and we work new age inventors of drones and UAVs for surveillance, defence, agriculture, medical transportation etc.

Furthermore, in India, we work with state governments in their skill missions in upskilling the engineering talent to be job ready especially for the MSMEs across the country. And have established a Centre of Excellence (3DEXPERIENCE Innovation Centre) in collaboration with the State Government of Karnataka focused on aerospace and defence. And we have collaborated with the Andhra Pradesh Government to set up similar Centres of Excellence, for both aerospace and defence, shipbuilding and automotive industries. At these centres our young Workforce of the Future will get an opportunity enhance their industry skills and domain knowledge through specialized curriculum prepared mainly to provide Industry / factory experience through virtual world covering design, simulation , manufacturing experiences of A&D products.

Digitalization via cloud — any specific technologies being offered to the Indian Armed Forces?

The growing focus of the Indian Government on the space sector development will require intelligent use of cloud based 3D design and engineering tools to unleash the full innovation potential for developing the next generation of indigenous rockets, satellites, and drones. At Dassault Systemes, we are working closely with the Government to democratizing 3D design and engineering tools through greater accessibility and availability of the technology for upcoming defence corridors, MSMEs, and drone manufacturing start-ups in India.

We are especially focusing on empowering the aerospace start-ups to drive innovation, in the Drones or Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) segment. With the right support, mentoring, and technology know-how, the current generation of start-ups can go toe-to-toe with the industry veterans and design efficient advanced UAVs unlocking their effective implementation in the Indian armed forces.

Finally, is the company doing anything in the Space Sector?

At Dassault Systemes, we are committed to enabling the emerging companies in the space sector with accurate know-how, profound knowledge, and expertise experience — to close the gap between two worlds by unlocking new prospects with advanced 3D design and engineering technologies. Our cloud-enabled 3DEXPERIENCE platform is an integrated solution that can help the New Space players to succeed in the new era of space and satellite technology. It can create the virtual twin experience, with an accurate and executable virtual model of the physical operations allowing companies to evaluate multiple what-if scenarios with ease and speed. It also strengthens their ability to design and manufacture sustainable ‘first-time-right’ rocketry and satellite systems with the required quality at lower costs and faster delivery of satellites into orbit.

Some of our customers in this segment have leveraged our 3DEXPERIENCE to accelerate the product lifecycle from concept to take-off.