SP’s AN SP GUIDE PUBLICATION ED BUYER ONLY) ED BUYER AS -B A NDI I 100.00 ( ` aviationSHARP CONTENT FOR SHARP AUDIENCE www.sps-aviation.com vol 21 ISSUE 1 • 2018 MILITARY BUSINESS AVIATION Disruptive Technologies Hopes in MRO from 2018 – Budget ‘18: Gulfstream IAF Perspective Modernis- ation Damper LAST CIVIL WORD Impact of An Budget on Opportunity UDAN Squandered RCS: Air +++ Deccan’s G.R. Gopinath PAge 14 HOPESfrom 2018 THE AIR COMBAT FORCE LEVELS AND CAPABILITY ENHANCEMENT IS RNI NUMBER: DELENG/2008/24199 A WORK IN PROGRESS FOR IAF AND WILL CONTinue in 2018 alsO Wings Ad.indd 13 01/11/17 2:12 PM PUBLISHER AND EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Jayant Baranwal SENIOR EDITOR TABLE OF CONTENTS Air Marshal B.K. Pandey (Retd) DEPUTY MANAGING EDITOR Neetu Dhulia SENIOR TECHNICAL GROUP EDITOR Lt General Naresh Chand (Retd) SP’s AN SP GUIDE PUBLICATION ASSISTANT FEATURES EDITOR Arpita Kala 100.00 (INDIA-BASED BUYER ONLY) BUYER 100.00 (INDIA-BASED PRINCIpaL CORRESPONDENT ` aviationSHARP CONTENT FOR SHARP AUDIENCE Rohit Srivastava www.sps-aviation.com VOL 21 ISSUE 1 • 2018 MILITARY BUSINESS AVIATION vol 21 ISSUE 1 • 2018 Disruptive Technologies Hopes CONTRIBUTORS in MRO from 2018 – India: Group Captain A.K. Sachdev (Retd), Budget ‘18: Gulfstream IAF Perspective Modernis- Group Captain Joseph Noronha (Retd) COVer IMAGE ation Damper LAST CIVIL WORD Europe: Alan Peaford The air combat force levels and capability Impact of An Budget on Opportunity enhancement is a work in progress for IAF and UDAN Squandered USA & Canada: LeRoy Cook RCS: Air +++ Deccan’s CHAIRmaN & MANAGING DIRECTOR will continue in 2018 also. It will assertively push G.R. Jayant Baranwal for its acceptance with the final decision makers Gopinath PLANNING & BUSINESS DEVELOpmENT to meet the existent or perceived threats to the PAGE 14 Executive Vice President: Rohit Goel national security. from ADMIN & COORDINATION COVer illUSTRAtion bY HOPES 2018 Bharti Sharma THE AIR COMBAT FORCE LEVELS AND CAPABILITY ENHANCEMENT IS Anoop Kamath RNI NUMBER: DELENG/2008/24199 A WORK IN PROGRESS FOR IAF AND WILL CONTINUE IN 2018 ALSO ASSt – AdMIN, HR & INFRA Pooja Tehlani SP's Aviation Cover 1-2018.indd 1 07/02/18 4:04 PM DESIGN Holistic Directions: Jayant Baranwal Creative Director: Anoop Kamath MILITARY REgular DepARTMENTS Designers: Vimlesh Kumar Yadav, Sonu Singh Bisht 5 MRO 2 A Word from Editor-in-Chief Research Assistant: Graphics Disruptive Technologies in Survi Massey 4 News with Views DIRECTOR: SALES & MARKETING Military MRO Neetu Dhulia Italian Court on AgustaWestland 8 Union Budget SALES & MARKETING Case General Manager Sales: Rajeev Chugh Defence Budget 2018: SP’S WEBSITES IAF Modernisation Damper 28 Hall of Fame Sr Web Developer: Shailendra P. Ashish Web Developer: Ugrashen Vishwakarma 14 2018 Kelly Johnson (1910-1990) © SP Guide Publications, 2018 Hopes From 2018: Crucial 29 News Digest Subscription/Circulation Aspects for IAF Annual Inland: `1,200 • Foreign: US$320 E-mail: [email protected] 17 Wrap-Up 32 Last Word [email protected] 2017: Eventful for Military Aviation An Opportunity Squandered LETTER TO EDITOR [email protected]; [email protected] 21 Upgrade For Advertising details, contact: Jaguar Upgrade Now or Never [email protected] [email protected] CIVIL SP GUIDE PUBLICATIONS PVT LTD A-133 Arjun Nagar, (Opposite Defence Colony) 10 Union Budget New Delhi 110003, India. Impact of Budget on UDAN Tel: +91 (11) 24644693, 24644763, 24620130 Awards 2017 Fax: +91 (11) 24647093 23 Cockpit Crew E-mail: [email protected] A Concrete Step to Address Pilot SPECIAL Representative Office CONTRIBUTION TO BENGALURU, INDIA Shortage 204, Jal Vayu Vihar, Kalyan Nagar, BUSINESS AVIATION Bengaluru 560043, India. 26 RCS Tel: +91 (80) 23682204 Air Deccan’s G.R. Gopinath: MOSCOW, RUSSIA Mad Scientist or a Brilliant LAGUK Co., Ltd., (Yuri Laskin) Krasnokholmskaya, Nab. Visionary? 11/15, app. 132, Moscow 115172, Russia. Tel: +7 (495) 911 2762 BUSINEss aVIATION Fax: +7 (495) 912 1260a 12 2018 MEMBER OF Hopes From 2018 – Gulfstream Perspective APPLIED FOR NEXT ISSUE: New Technologies www.sps-aviation.comWWW.SPGUIDEPUBLICATIONS.COM ISSUE 1 • 2018 1 A WORD from editOR-in-CHIEF Our valuable readers will notice that we have redesigned SP’s Aviation. We do believe that the new appearance of the magazine will appear to be much smarter, more readable and compact, and therefore interestingly informative Perhaps the most important event for the nation in In the regime of civil aviation, John Slattery, President & the recent past has been the unveiling of the Union Budget for CEO, Embraer Commercial Aviation, highlights a problem faced the financial year 2018-19. This is an event of national con- by the global civil aviation industry, that of shortage of pilots. cern since it affects every section of the society in the country The author is of the view that with the robust growth in air including the Indian armed forces. The most notable impact of travel likely in the next two decades, the problem is likely to the budgetary allocation for defence would be on the ongoing become more acute. Fortunately, the global airline industry is process of its modernisation. In a write up in this issue of SP’s seized with this problem and has begun initiating measures to Aviation on the budget, Air Marshal Sukhchain Singh (Retd) has mitigate the gravity of the situation. analysed its impact on the modernisation of the Indian Air Force Writing about Regional Aviation in India, Arpita Kala looks at (IAF). The author is of the view that given the marginal incre- Captain Gopinath’s airline endeavour with the 19-seater Beech- ment in the allocation for acquisition projects and the colossal craft 1900D to exploit opportunities in the Regional Connectivity backlog, there is little possibility of the modernisation process Scheme as also the challenges that lie ahead for him. In the sec- picking up any momentum. In fact the author sees the budget- ond article, Arpita Kala speaks of the positive impact on the Indian ary allocation for defence for the year 2018-19 as a “damper” civil aviation industry of the Union Budget unveiled recently by for the process of modernisation of the IAF. the Minister of Finance Arun Jaitley. The author is of the view The Air Marshal has also analysed the state of Maintenance, that while the prospects for Indian civil aviation are bright, the Repair and Overall (MRO) and the new technologies such as 3D extremely slow progress in the new international airport project printing, Artificial Intelligence and E Maintenance Management at Navi Mumbai is a matter of serious concern for the industry. Systems that are being developed to enable the MRO services All this and more in this issue of SP’s Aviation. Welcome to keep pace with the escalating demand from the field. The aboard and happy landing! author is of the view that enhancing capabilities of the MRO Jai Hind! segment of military aviation will go a long way towards improv- ing the flight-line availability of military aviation platforms. In this issue of the magazine, Rohit Srivastava has cata- logued some of the major events during the year gone by, related to the regime of military aviation both in India and the world. However, as for military aviation in India, there is con- siderable backlog and much is still left to be done. We will look forward for a more promising year ahead! Rohit Srivastava also looks at the case for fitting the Jaguar fleet of the IAF with a more powerful engine as the fleet is still left with consider- able airframe life. Unfortunately, the case appears to have got JAYANT BARANWAL bogged down on account of the complexities of the Defence Procurement Procedure. PUBLISHER & EDITor-in-CHIEF Owned, published and printed by Jayant Baranwal, printed at Kala Jyothi Process Pvt Ltd and published at A-133, Arjun Nagar (Opposite Defence Colony), New Delhi 110003, India. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, FOLLOW US ON photocopying, recording, electronic, or otherwise without prior written permission of the Publishers. 2 ISSUE 1 • 2018 www.sps-aviation.com SeaGuardian MULTI-ROLE SINGLE SOLUTION www.ga-asi.com ©2017 General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. Leading the Situational Awareness Revolution NEWS with vieWS NEWS ITALIAN COURT ON AGUSTAWESTLAND CASE On Monday, January 8, 2018, the Italian Court of Appeal of Milan has acquit- ted Giuseppe Orsi, former President of Italian defence and aerospace major Finmeccanica and Bruno Spagnolin, former CEO of its subsidiary AgustaWestland, of corruption charges involving a multi-crore deal with India for VVIP helicopters. The decision of the Court was based on lack of evidence on account of which the charges against the two executives could not be substantiated. The development came more than a year after a court sentenced Orsi to 4.5 years and Spagnolini to four years in jail on cor- ruption charges related to a `3,600 crore contract to supply a dozen heli- copters to New Delhi. The case against Orsi and Spagnolini was a result of an investigation launched in 2012. VIEWS In February 2010, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) under On April 8, 2016, the Milan Court of Appeal overturned a the UPA II Government had concluded a `3,600 crore contract lower court verdict and convicted Giuseppe Orsi to four years’ with AgustaWestland, the British subsidiary of the Italian aero- imprisonment for paying a hefty bribe to senior functionaries in space major Finmeccanica, to purchase 12 AW101 helicopters India that included politicians, bureaucrats and officers of the for Air Headquarters Communication Squadron based at Palam, IAF. However, on December 16, 2016, the Italian Supreme Court New Delhi.