The Hindu Business Line : TCS' defence, aerospace designs set for takeoff

At a glance
Plan to grow engineering services business four-fold to $1 billion.
More investments into avionics, high-end design for aircraft.

SCALING NEW HEIGHTS: A file picture of Mr Ratan Tata, Chairman, Tata group, before he flew an F/A-18 Super Hornet at Aero India 2007 at Yelahanka Air Station in Bangalore recently. - Bhagya Prakash K

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Bangalore Feb. 19 Software services major TCS says it sees defence and aerospace as its next big global opportunity in engineering and design outsourcing.

Quite a few standalone and offset prospects from defence and civil aviation deals already hover over Indian businesses.

TCS, for its part, will see a spurt of activity on these two fronts, according to its senior officials.

While Tata group companies are not new to defence or aerospace work, these areas are said to be the group's priorities after its automotive success.

Globally, aircraft majors are cutting production cost and time to market; "Aerospace is the next wave of opportunity. Increasingly, TCS will play a very deep role in this space," Mr Regu Ayyasamy, Chennai-based Vice-President, Engineering & Industrial Services unit, told Business Line.

Boeing IDS and Lockheed Martin say they are talking to TCS for possible relationships for either future defence deal offsets or independently for their global requirements.

Glimpse TCS's aerospace designs: it has taken up a couple of airframe designs for UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles used for military and security surveillance).

New impetus

Part of the TCS 2010 goal to get into the global Top 10 is a plan to enhance its engineering services business four-fold to $1 billion.

The sub-plot is to raise the aerospace business contribution from 15 per cent to around 25 per cent, making it the second top earning engineering vertical by then.

"There is a new impetus (at TCS) for defence and aerospace," said Mr R. Suresh Babu, Director, Aerospace Practice, Bangalore. Employee numbers in aerospace are set to double and grow at 50-60 per cent a year as it improves its market share.

"We are investing in capabilities such as avionics and high-end design for large aircraft. Investments are going into additional demonstration labs, innovation centres, embedded avionics systems, hardware and software testing. Talent is being scaled up to do large aircraft designs," Mr Ayyaswamy said.

Starting with its early work for GE aeroengines in 1992, the $3-billion company has handled aerospace design, structures and composites for mostly civil players.

Clientele

Among its clients are Airbus, Dassault, United Technologies, Safran, Bombardier, Honeywell, Martin Baker; and at home, HAL, ISRO, IAF and DRDO.

The MNC interest is not just for cost arbitrage - put at 30 per cent - but also for the availability of qualified engineers.

Having worked on HAL's IJT (intermediate jet trainer) programme, TCS is "very focussed on the Indian scenario also."

It may then be no `plane' coincidence that at the recent Aero India, the Tata group Chairman, Mr Ratan Tata, flew the Boeing and Lockheed fighters.

Or the fact that the Boeing stall, where he tried out the Super Hornet simulator, was right opposite the TCS camp.

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