Tuesday, November 25, 2014: The ‘Make In India’ initiative by PM Narendra Modi was embraced as a “laudable effort” by Vivek Lall, global chief executive for international strategic development for electromagnetic systems of the US based global defence and nuclear giant General Atomics. He said that the campaign can attract many players from the US who are willing to co-manufacture and co-develop products for the Indian and other markets across the world by making India the base.
He said, “Both governments can play the role of facilitators as ultimately the businesses in both countries will lead the technology revolution.” He further stated that there is a renewed vigour in the corporate world to evaluate upon how these two countries can engage from technology and innovation perspective.
Lall further added that there are many US companies which have niche technology for different applications in various industries including defence. He noted, “The key is then how do you build partnership where technology could be truly absorbed for the Indian industry, the corporate sector and in the defence sector.”
While highlighting the cutting-edge technology in nuclear and defence fields and the need for an effective research to evaluate how solar power can be used to meet energy need, he said that all these technologies and plans may take several years to unfold. However he stressed over the need to identify projects which can be executed together by the governments and companies both in India and US.
He said, “When Prime Minister Narendra Modi was in Washington there was lot of talk on Defence Technology Initiative (DTI) as there are lot of defence projects that could be part of it. If we sow the seeds now then a competitive industry will be created then whether or not you have an offset policy, companies will come and set up base in India. US companies are very optimistic about coming to India and make India their hub for exports to other parts of the world.”
