Fleet still there: India has scrapped a multi-billion dollar submarine tender
A multibillion-dollar tender for the construction of six submarines for the country's navy has been disrupted in India. The reason was complaints by local contractors about non-compliance with conditions on the part of their German and Spanish colleagues. They said this was evident during sea trials of key submarine-building technologies in June. New Delhi plans to study each complaint, so the contract has been suspended for a year, but further delays are likely. Details - in the material "Izvestia".
Shortlisted
"The nature and timing of the complaints raise questions about whether the contractors are trying to put the project on hold for fear of losing profits," Bloomberg news agency reported, citing sources, emphasizing that these developments occurred before the selection of the winning bidder.
Three years ago, New Delhi announced a $6 billion tender for the Project 75 India project to build six stealthy diesel-electric submarines (SSBNs) in cooperation with foreign partners. They are to be equipped with cruise missiles and an air-independent propulsion system that allows the vessels to remain submerged for up to 20 days.
Type 214 submarine manufactured by German ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems, which was shortlisted for the tender
The Indian Defense Ministry initially shortlisted German ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems, Spain's Navantia, France's Naval Group, South Korea's Daewoo and Rosoboronexport as bidders.
The battle for the tender entered a decisive phase at the end of October 2024. The main battle was between Germany's ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems, cooperating with India's Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited and Spain's Navantia. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez paid one after the other visits to the country. Among others, they visited the shipyards as well.
Spanish S-80 class submarine tendered in the port of Cartagena
However, India's defense ministry suddenly suspended the announcement of the winner for at least a year and formed a special committee to look into complaints by local contractors that German and Spanish bidders were not complying with the terms and conditions for providing submarine construction technology.
How long the investigation will last and whether the tender will continue afterward is not known.
Failed to meet expectations
The Economic Times quoted sources as saying that the delay in announcing the winner was a serious blow to the Indian government's program to modernize the national navy "against the backdrop of the growing strengthening of China's naval forces".
At the same time, the publication previously wrote that ThyssenKrupp Marine Sistems was the closest to winning the tender.
Currently, the Indian Navy has more than 130 ships and submarines in service, as well as 143 airplanes and 130 helicopters for various purposes. By 2035, as The Times of India wrote, the country plans to increase the number of submarines and ships to 175.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi intends to increase the state's export capabilities by abandoning imported weapons as part of India's national Make in India program.
The project, dubbed Project 75 India, was supposed to be implemented on Indian soil.
Part of the updated defense procurement policy was an international tender for submarine construction. According to the plan, foreign companies should cooperate with India - one of the world's largest arms importers - and provide it with technology to produce military hardware.
What experts think
According to Ilya Kramnik, a researcher at the Center for Strategic Planning Studies at IMEMO RAN, on the one hand, the failure of Western competitors could give a new impetus to Russian-Indian cooperation in modernizing the Indian Navy, given Moscow's readiness to fulfill New Delhi's key demand for technology transfer.
- But, on the other hand, Russia has nothing much to offer India in terms of construction of non-nuclear submarines. There is no modern serial project, and there is no equipment, first of all, air-independent power plant and modern batteries. The tender is significant for India, its fleet needs to change submarines. Moscow can and is ready to transfer technologies, but we do not have enough of them everywhere," the expert explained.
Alexei Kupriyanov, head of the South Asia and Indian Ocean Group at the Center for Asia-Pacific Studies of IMEMO RAS, noted in a conversation with Izvestia that Indians have no roughly equal rivals in the region.
- Pakistanis are much weaker, Chinese military presence is small. They are surpassed only by the Americans, but India has normal relations with the US. Theoretically, the country needs submarines for the future, but it is not critical for it now. There are no threats facing India now," the expert explained.
He added, this story is about the fact that there are quite a lot of players in Indian tenders. Thus, the main interested force is the navy, which wants new submarines, and it wants them to be fashionable French or German submarines. On the other hand, there is the Ministry of Defense, which is interested in maximum participation of local companies.
According to the specialist, the Indian Defense Ministry is mainly engaged in technical support of the troops.
- By and large, it turns out that the ministry wants to involve as many local contractors as possible, while the military wants either German or French products. This is a perennial problem and the same applies to the Indian Air Force," the Indologist informed.
The analyst stressed that the Indian Defense Ministry is advocating those models and brands of equipment that can be manufactured in Indian factories. This will help develop the domestic industry and enrich the local manufacturer, and the military wants something new and pretty.
- This is one example of such a struggle, there is nothing urgent. The current situation cannot be called a big blow to India's powerful program, the country is not on the brink of war. Everything will determine how things will develop further. What kind of equipment Indians will buy depends on various lobbying groups associated with this or that manufacturer," the political analyst summarized.
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