India is eyeing the export market for the indigenously developed torpedoes by the NSTL (Naval Science & Technology Laboratory), Visakhapatnam.
To push this initiative the Government has facilitated a memorandum of understanding between the Bharat Dynamics Ltd (BDL), a defence public sector unit and the L&T. The objective is to export Torpedoes (LWT-XP), designed and developed by NSTL.
According to a press release, the MoU was signed by V Udaya Bhaskar, Chairman & Managing Director, BDL and Jayanth Patil, Head of Defence, L&T. They exchanged documents of the agreement in the presence of Union Minister of Defence & Finance, Arun Jaitley and his deputy Subhash Bhamre recently. Top executives of both companies and the Chief of DRDO, S Christopher were present.
The Hyderabad-based, BDL which is the main producer of all indigenously developed missiles will manufacture the torpedoes. It has several production units in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.
The NSTL is a leading research lab, under the Defence Research & Development Organisation (DRDO), which is supporting the Indian Navy. It has developed the torpedoes, which are being inducted into the Naval battle ships.
The L&T, one of India’s leading construction and Infrastructure giants has diversified into the defence sector with expertise and production strengths in missiles, guns and armoured vehicles.