Israeli-Indian JV to make small arms in private sector

[illusion8]

It's a great step for the security and military forces in India.

For the private manufacturing firms in India, it is a huge slap on their faces, it points towards sheer incompetency that they cannot design and develop small arms without foreign help. A tiny little firm like Keltec here can churn out innovative firearms and manufacturing giants in India are sucking there thumbs.

I agree with your point, but if I was a private player, I would look at it with economics in mind.

1. Why reinvent the wheel.

2. IWI brings an already open local and international market to sell to.

3. Buyers locally are only the armed forces - assuming, I spend millions in R&D and invent a new firearm, it will take almost a decade for the army or paramilitary to complete the trials without me knowing that it will be approved or not in the end - remember that there is no private market locally.

4. International buyers will readily accept IWI products compared to my new invention because IWI has already run through the selling and trial process.

So economically, it makes perfect sense to go in for jv with a ready product and manufacturing process knowhow in place.

 

[MilSpec]

I agree with your point, but if I was a private player, I would look at it with economics in mind.

1. Why reinvent the wheel.

2. IWI brings an already open local and international market to sell to.

3. Buyers locally are only the armed forces - assuming, I spend millions in R&D and invent a new firearm, it will take almost a decade for the army or paramilitary to complete the trials without me knowing that it will be approved or not in the end - remember that there is no private market locally.

4. International buyers will readily accept IWI products compared to my new invention because IWI has already run through the selling and trial process.

So economically, it makes perfect sense to go in for jv with a ready product and manufacturing process knowhow in place.

I will recycle an older post.

Lets look at Indian Armed forces, Military/para/law enforcement

1,129,900 active Army personnel, 960,000 Reserve forces
58,350 Active Navy personnel, 55,000 Reserve forces
127,200 IAF active personnel 140,000 Reserve forces
Indian Coast Guard 9,550
1,300,586 Indian Paramilitary Forces 987,821 Reserve forces

That brings the active military strength at around 1315450, for a pessimistic projection say 1/2 of them are combatants in case of war that is around 6.5 lakh combatants, even we can project a weapons requirement to down to less than even half of that (3 lakhs) 2.5 lakh battle rifles and equal number of side arm like semi auto handgun, and around 20,000 squad support rifles, another 20,000 carbines (assume intermediate caliber) and say 10,000 precision marksman rifles.

Reserve forces have an approximate strength of around say 1155000, forget arming them completely, just to train them 1 rifle for 10 reservists, thats nearly 1.15lakh rifles, which can be broken down into 30,000 battle rifles, bolt rifles and .22 semi auto training rifles respectively.

ignoring the coast guard s, we still have around 13 lakh para mil forces, again say 1/4th of them can be need newer firearms which brings a projection of arming say 3 lakh units with semi auto handguns with the addition of a carbine/battle rifle of less 1/2 of them.
thats around 3 lakh semi auto pistols and around 1lakh carbines (say pistol caliber) and 50000 battle rifles.


that pessimistically projects a requirement of
Battle rifles 280000 units, (assume 70,000 7.62 Nato, 210000 5.56 Nato)
Carbines 120000 (80000 5.56 caliber, 40,000 .45acp)
Semi auto Handguns 550000 (9mm)
Squad support rifles 20000
Precision Sniper rifles 10000
Bolt action rifles 30000
.22 training rifles 30000

for sake of simplicity lets assume dirt cheap prices for all of them
battle rifle both calibers 500$ (same as insas)
carbines say 400$ (although cxstorm is nearly 1200$)
semi auto handguns at 400$ (although a berreta 92fs iss 600$)
Squad support rifles at 2000$
precision sniper rifle at 2500$ (although even a used dragonuv is around 3000$ and barret m82 runs you 5000$)
Bolt action rifle at 300$ (savage fcns is around twice that price)
.22 training rifle at 150$ (ruger 10/22 around 300$)


Battle rifles 140 Mil dollars
Carbines 48 Mil dollars
Semi auto Handguns 220 Mil dollars
Squad support rifles 40 Mil dollars
Precision Sniper rifles 25 Mil dollars
Bolt action rifles 9 Mil dollars
.22 training rifles 4.5 Mil dollars


The point of this entire example is to give you the rough idea that just by internal consumption (discounting civilian arms) with extremely pessimistic projections in both cost and quantity, you can have a decent market for small arms, but lethargic policy making is preventing this industry. The day this changes, I might pack my backs to go back……

Source: India's Small Arms Dillema

 

[Water Car Engineer]

They were show casing the Lynx sniper rifle some time ago. They want to get into the small arms game for sure. And India needs alternatives to OFB badly.

 

[illusion8]

I will recycle an older post.

Lets look at Indian Armed forces, Military/para/law enforcement

1,129,900 active Army personnel, 960,000 Reserve forces
58,350 Active Navy personnel, 55,000 Reserve forces
127,200 IAF active personnel 140,000 Reserve forces
Indian Coast Guard 9,550
1,300,586 Indian Paramilitary Forces 987,821 Reserve forces

That brings the active military strength at around 1315450, for a pessimistic projection say 1/2 of them are combatants in case of war that is around 6.5 lakh combatants, even we can project a weapons requirement to down to less than even half of that (3 lakhs) 2.5 lakh battle rifles and equal number of side arm like semi auto handgun, and around 20,000 squad support rifles, another 20,000 carbines (assume intermediate caliber) and say 10,000 precision marksman rifles.

Reserve forces have an approximate strength of around say 1155000, forget arming them completely, just to train them 1 rifle for 10 reservists, thats nearly 1.15lakh rifles, which can be broken down into 30,000 battle rifles, bolt rifles and .22 semi auto training rifles respectively.

ignoring the coast guard s, we still have around 13 lakh para mil forces, again say 1/4th of them can be need newer firearms which brings a projection of arming say 3 lakh units with semi auto handguns with the addition of a carbine/battle rifle of less 1/2 of them.
thats around 3 lakh semi auto pistols and around 1lakh carbines (say pistol caliber) and 50000 battle rifles.


that pessimistically projects a requirement of
Battle rifles 280000 units, (assume 70,000 7.62 Nato, 210000 5.56 Nato)
Carbines 120000 (80000 5.56 caliber, 40,000 .45acp)
Semi auto Handguns 550000 (9mm)
Squad support rifles 20000
Precision Sniper rifles 10000
Bolt action rifles 30000
.22 training rifles 30000

for sake of simplicity lets assume dirt cheap prices for all of them
battle rifle both calibers 500$ (same as insas)
carbines say 400$ (although cxstorm is nearly 1200$)
semi auto handguns at 400$ (although a berreta 92fs iss 600$)
Squad support rifles at 2000$
precision sniper rifle at 2500$ (although even a used dragonuv is around 3000$ and barret m82 runs you 5000$)
Bolt action rifle at 300$ (savage fcns is around twice that price)
.22 training rifle at 150$ (ruger 10/22 around 300$)


Battle rifles 140 Mil dollars
Carbines 48 Mil dollars
Semi auto Handguns 220 Mil dollars
Squad support rifles 40 Mil dollars
Precision Sniper rifles 25 Mil dollars
Bolt action rifles 9 Mil dollars
.22 training rifles 4.5 Mil dollars


The point of this entire example is to give you the rough idea that just by internal consumption (discounting civilian arms) with extremely pessimistic projections in both cost and quantity, you can have a decent market for small arms, but lethargic policy making is preventing this industry. The day this changes, I might pack my backs to go back……

Source: India's Small Arms Dillema

Of course, there is a huge market..

The difference between a private player and a defense PSU is the incubation period...

A private player cannot spend years on R&D and then years on trial run, which a PSU can easily do.

A private player needs to fill up his order books and show sales to his share holders and cannot wait for years for the first orders to trickle in..

A easy way out will be to tie up with an existing manufacturer and start manufacturing and marketing a ready product while working on the R&D for new one's.

The PSU's need to up their ante.

 

[sathya]

Not long go, I got fretted because we don't make a quality inverter air conditioner

Components are imported from china, it make it cheaper at the cost of quality.

Made in Thailand products are hailed as superior quality products.

When a air conditioner haven't achieved anything , I can't expect anything in defence industry from private co.
Only a select few companies do quality business , they should be awarded with contracts.

 

[MilSpec]

Of course, there is a huge market..

The difference between a private player and a defense PSU is the incubation period...

A private player cannot spend years on R&D and then years on trial run, which a PSU can easily do.

A private player needs to fill up his order books and show sales to his share holders and cannot wait for years for the first orders to trickle in..

A easy way out will be to tie up with an existing manufacturer and start manufacturing and marketing a ready product while working on the R&D for new one's.

The PSU's need to up their ante.

buddy, It doesn't take years on r&d to design small arms. That is the prime reason for mentioning Keltec, Keltec SU16 sereies, RDB, and M43 are prime examples of a tiny little company churning out innovative production models every other year. There are other examples too. My point is small arms are exactly as complex a stapler mechanically. It should not take "years" of design process. If Indian companies can churn out a new motorcycle every 4 months, It just perplexes me that, there is no private player taking a serious swing at this market.

 

[Water Car Engineer]

buddy, It doesn't take years on r&d to design small arms. That is the prime reason for mentioning Keltec, Keltec SU16 sereies, RDB, and M43 are prime examples of a tiny little company churning out innovative production models every other year. There are other examples too. My point is small arms are exactly as complex a stapler mechanically. It should not take "years" of design process. If Indian companies can churn out a new motorcycle every 4 months, It just perplexes me that, there is no private player taking a serious swing at this market.

Indian auto companies also started out by license producing from other designs as well. Mahindra tried to get into the small arms game back in 03, I forgot what happened, but they were restricted in a way from enter or getting any orders out of it.

It's not fair to compare Indian and US market, defence environment. OFB has a complete, forced monoply in small arms. Why would they waste their resources to make a design that might not even be looked at?

Frankly, I expect these firms who are just trying to get into small arms to start out by license producing. Let them get some actual orders out of it, then we'll see.

 

[MilSpec]

Indian auto companies also started out by license producing from other designs as well. Mahindra tried to get into the small arms game back in 03, I forgot what happened, but they were restricted in a way from enter or getting any orders out of it.

It's not fair to compare Indian and US market, defence environment. OFB has a complete, forced monoply in small arms. Why would they waste their resources to make a design that might not even be looked at?

Frankly, I expect these firms who are just trying to get into small arms to start out by license producing. Let them get some actual orders out of it, then we'll see.

This is one area govt needs to look at some reform.