Rolls-Royce plans big investment in India; eyes jet engine, naval propulsion programmes

New Delhi: British aero-engine maker Rolls-Royce on Sunday said it is looking at making India its third "home market" outside of the UK in line with a plan to unlock the full potential of opportunities across an array of domains, including jet engines, naval propulsion, land systems and advanced engineering.

In an interview to PTI, Sashi Mukundan, the executive vice president of Rolls-Royce India, elaborating on the move, said the company is planning for a "big investment" in the country, and listed developing a next-generation aero engine in India as a priority to power the combat jets that New Delhi will produce under the Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA) programme.

Mukundan also highlighted how Rolls-Royce can contribute significantly to addressing India's requirement for electric propulsion capability for boosting the Indian Navy's combat prowess.

The AMCA engine core can be modified into a naval marine engine and it can also be used for electric propulsion, he suggested, noting that Rolls-Royce is among a very few engine makers globally to have the capability to "marinize the aero engine".

Mukundan, without divulging specific details, said Rolls-Royce was eyeing making a significant investment to expand its footprint in India, noting that the country has "scale, policy clarity and a strong push" towards a defence and industrial ecosystem that is expanding rapidly and becoming more sophisticated.

"If everything goes well, it would be a significant investment. It'll be big enough that people will notice it, but I don't want to put a number to it. What matters is the impact of this investment, which would be the development of the entire value chain and ecosystem here across sectors that we operate in," he said.

The top Rolls-Royce executive said the company will firm up two Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs) with two defence public sector undertakings in India. While one pact is for manufacturing the engines for the Arjun tanks, the other is for engines for the future ready combat vehicles.

In October, CEO Tufan Erginbilgic, during a business roundtable had conveyed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi that India is going to be very critical for Rolls-Royce going forward.

"We have developed two other home markets outside the UK -- the US and Germany. We want to make India our next one. What do we mean by that? We want to do everything across the field, and it's not just defence," Mukundan said.

"That ambition cuts across defence, naval propulsion, land systems, manufacturing, advanced engineering skills and technology development, all of which align closely with India's own priorities," he said.

On the engines for AMCA, Mukundan said extensive discussions and background work are underway on how to move forward.

"If India is thinking about next-generation engines, Rolls-Royce is probably the best partner. We have the capability, we have the experience both in India and globally, and we have repeatedly demonstrated that we can do it," he said.

Mukundan said all of the engine design work can be done in India, with the relevant technology transferred and all new intellectual property (IP) rights can be jointly owned with India.

"Once you own design IP, you have strategic control. Manufacturing then becomes the next stage, and that is always more complex. It's about ensuring that capability is built systematically and safely," he said.

The top executive said that Rolls-Royce engines for AMCA could be helpful for India in developing electric propulsion for naval engines.

Elaborating on it, he said essentially, electric and hybrid propulsion naval engines are marine gas turbines, which are built from the aero engine core.

"Rolls-Royce is one of the few engine makers who have the capability to marinize the aero engine at scale. Why this matters is that it is not viable to build an entire marine propulsion supply chain from scratch here because the quantities in the navy are very low," he said.

"But if the aero-core derivative is built and co-designed in India, the overlapping supply chain becomes justifiable and can support both the aero and naval marine," he noted.

Mukundan also highlighted Rolls-Royce's dominance in the global jet engine manufacturing.

"If we look at it globally, we've been building and certifying engines every 18 months, including combat and commercial. If I talk specifically about combat, we power the Eurofighter Typhoon with our EJ200 engine, which is one of our recent engine programmes, with 90 kilonewton thrust capacity." He also said that Rolls-Royce is leading the mandate of the Global Combat Aircraft Programme, which is an initiative of the UK, along with Japan and Italy, to develop a sixth-generation aircraft engine.

"We were also part of a joint program where GE and Rolls-Royce together developed an engine specifically for the fifth-generation F-35, which is another example of recent engine development, particularly in the thrust range or even above the thrust range that India is looking to build," Mukundan said.

The F-136 engine was the only engine specifically developed for the F-35 aircraft, with engine development led by GE Aviation and Rolls-Royce.

The executive vice president sounded bullish on India and especially pointed out the Indian government's "visible focus" on building indigenous capability across naval, land and air domains.

"Over the long term, India will be a major global power. And India is increasingly supporting others in the Global South. For us, there is a lot to work with, and it is all linked," he said.

"It's not just about market access; India is one of the few places where all the pieces genuinely fit together." "For Rolls-Royce, that makes India not just an important market, but a long-term strategic home," he said.

Mukundan also briefly touched upon the commercial aviation sector in India and described it as a rapidly growing market where Rolls-Royce has the most advanced technology offerings to power and propel the growth.

"We are already partnering in expansion plans of some of the biggest carriers in the country."

"Then there is energy security where we are supporting backup power generation for critical defence and civil infrastructure, such as airports, as well as data centres and the semiconductor industry," he said.