Engineering and construction company L&T inked a joint venture agreement with European defence major MBDA Missile Systems.
The JV is for development of missiles in India.
L&T will own 51 per cent stake in the JV named L&T MBDA Missile Systems and the rest 49 with the European partner.
Initially, the JV will look to develop and supply fifth generation anti-tank guided missiles (ATGM5s), missiles for coastal batteries and high speed target drones.
The JV will also focus on opportunities in missile and missile systems domain.
It will target prospects under different categories of defence procurement which has specific requirements for design developed and manufactured in India.
L&T is betting big on defence sector considering the government’s focus on Make In India and its decision it to procure missile systems from abroad.
L&T is targeting an annual turnover of INR 10,000 crore from its defence vertical by 2021.
The JV expects to roll out the first product in the next two years. Although it hasn’t finalised on where the missile systems will be manufactured, the company has shortlisted two out of L&T’s nine facilities.
MBDA is jointly owned by AIRBUS Group (37.5%), BAE Systems (37.5%) and Leonardo (25%).
About MBDA- Industry: Defence, attack
- Founded: December 2001
- Headquarters: Paris, France; Stevenage, United Kingdom; Rome, Italy; Schrobenhausen, Germany
- CEO: Antoine Bouvier (CEO)
- Products: Missiles, missiles systems, countermeasures, countermining
- Revenue: € 2.9 billion
- Number of employees: 10,000
- Divisions: MBDA Deutschland GmbH; MBDA Inc.
- Subsidiaries: Matra Électronique
- Website: mbda-systems.com
