India has immense potential to absorb sensitive technologies for own needs and exports: Naval Group

India has immense potential to absorb sensitive defence technologies not just for its own domestic needs but for exports to friendly countries as well, the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of a leading global naval design and construction group has said.

In an interview, Eric Papin, CTO of the Naval Group said that the French company is looking at India beyond just as a manufacturing destination and projects are underway to jointly develop new technologies. He also expressed confidence that Indian entities are well positioned to `innovate for the future’.

“I am particularly mentioning this in light of the air independent propulsion for submarines, closely monitored by Indian government. This collaborative approach will be extended for more such projects in field of futuristic underwater weapons and drones,” he said.


Papin recently met representatives from key Indian companies at the Namaste France event. More than 40 Indian and French companies took part in the event that was aimed at forging collaborations and joint projects in the future. “Naval Group aims to go beyond ‘Make in India’ and we firmly believe that India has immense capacity to absorb sensitive technologies for its domestic needs and for ambitious vision for defence export to friendly countries,” he said.

The French group makes a range of nuclear and conventional submarines, surface ships and underwater weapon systems. It is currently working with Mazagaon Dockyards Limited for the construction of six submarines for the Indian Navy that have been named as the Kalvari class.

The senior French executive said that future conventional submarines are being offered with the latest generation of lithium ion batteries (LIB). “The benefits of LIB could be significantly better compared to lead acid batteries by allowing more useful energy available, increased submerged autonomy, reduced indiscretion rate, better availability and better maintainability,” he said.

He added that in recent years, the company has focused on energy efficiency (with modern batteries based on lithium ion technology), unmanned underwater platforms of various sizes and missions, integrating different unmanned vessel and use of artificial intelligence in underwater drones.

The CTO said that collaborations have been forged by Naval Group and French institutes with top Indian academic institutions like IITs and NITs for research on new technologies. Some of these include underwater signal analyses using AI, Track Motion Analyses and Non Destructive Test on special materials.