Boeing on Monday said that it would require more orders from India before it thinks of setting up a final civil aircraft assembly line in the country.
Salil Gupte, Boeing India and South Asia President, told Reuters that the aircraft manufacturer will look into establishing the new facility once it sees enough demand from India. “The business case in order to have final assembly in any region has to be far larger than what the Indian market is. It requires many more airplanes than are being bought in India today,” the executive said.
Speaking in an interview on the sidelines of the Aero India show in Bengaluru, the executive said that the situation in Indian markets needs to be evaluated. “We’ll have to see how it evolves as the markets in India and around India go. In the meantime, it is all about building step wise capability to get up to that point,” he added.
Boeing’s Presence In The Subcontinent
Last week, Boeing noted that it expects an addition of 2,385 commercial aircraft in the fleet of Indian and South Asian airlines over the next two decades. This would mark a four-fold jump over the current levels.
Elaborating on the issues faced by the supply chain, the Boeing executive said that the Indian authorities need to give incentives to suppliers to reduce the cost of capital in the country to help grow the aerospace supply chain.
Boeing gets products and services worth $1.25 billion from India each year from a network of over 300 suppliers, and employs almost 7,000 people in the country. The company also operates a joint venture with the Tata Group and produces AH-64 Apache helicopter fuselages and 737 aircraft vertical fin structures for its clients worldwide.
This puts a damper on the Indian government’s hopes of the manufacturing assembling commercial jets in the country. Notably, last year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said India will not need to wait too long for a Boeing that is designed and manufactured in the country.
According to data from Cirium Ascend, domestic airlines including Air India and IndiGo have nearly 1,800 aircraft on order with global manufacturers and are expected to take delivery of 130 jets this year.
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