US, UK in race for making fighter engine in India

The UK and the US are making a strong bid for collaboration to power the next generation of Indian combat aircraft as the country's talks with France to co-develop a new fighter jet engine remain stalled.

India has been looking for partners to develop an engine that provides at least 110 kilonewton, or kN, of thrust and would be used for future projects like the proposed advanced medium combat aircraft (AMCA) and a twin-engine deck-based fighter.

While the country has concluded a joint capability study with the UK, the US is hard-selling its engines as the ideal choice given that they already power the indigenous light combat aircraft (LCA).


An indigenous fighter jet engine is considered one of the most vital components towards self-reliance in defence for India, with the technology currently available with only five nations across the world.

China, which struggled with reliability issues on locally made engines copied from Russia, has been making rapid improvements in this area, according to defence experts.

Discussions with France to utilise a part of the Rafale fighter jet deal offsets to co-develop an engine have been on for close to seven years, without any conclusion.

The UK, which is making a strong push to co-develop engines under a government-to-government umbrella, has offered crediting of full intellectual property (IP) of the product to India.

A joint assessment that involved engineers from India and the UK is learnt to have concluded that the entire process to develop and certify a new military engine would take close to eight years. The UK offer is to develop a brand-new engine that India can produce and even export without hindrances.

"What the UK is committed to is the biggest ever capability transfer in history. This means ensuring that the engine that is co-created would be to Indian specifications and if India wants to export it, that would be a matter entirely for India to decide," UK minister for defence procurement Alex Chalk said.

Research and development efforts towards creating a new engine from scratch to Indian military specifications is expected to cost in excess of $2 b, or about '16,500 cr.

As per discussions with France in 2016, the development costs would have been in excess of $750 million, or about '6,600 crore, if offset commitments from the Rafale fighter jet were utilised. This cost estimate could now be significantly higher, given inflation over the past seven years.

The US, which has traditionally had reservations over technology transfer of key aspects of fighter jet engines, is also in the fray, with discussions on to leverage on the LCA deal. American engines have been selected for a Mk2 version of the jet as well as the initial batch of advanced medium combat aircraft.

The US has committed to producing these engines in India, but the quantum of technology transfer has not been decided. The American engine being supplied is rated at 98 kN of power and discussions are underway for moving towards the 110 kN requirement.