Thursday, April 2, 2020

Karnataka exempts aerospace and defence firms from Covid-19 lockdown


Indian aerospace and defence firms believe that uninterrupted and timely supply remains critical for their credibility.


In a decisive measure to protect Karnataka based companies that manufacture parts and systems for the assembly lines of global aerospace and defence (A&D) majors like Boeing and Airbus, the state government has exempted local A&D manufacturers from the nationwide anti-Covid-19 lockdown and permitted them to resume manufacturing activities with immediate effect.

“…The State Government hereby [exempts] industries supplying to Defence & Aerospace manufacturing… from the purview of the Lockdown and further to relax the restrictions imposed on the movement of workers and staff working in these industrial units,” stated a circular issued on Wednesday by Gaurav Gupta, the principle secretary in Karnataka’s commerce and industries department.

This comes as a relief to Karnataka’s A&D manufacturing firms, consisting mostly of medium, small and micro enterprises (MSMEs) such as Dynamatic Technologies, Rossell India Ltd and Sasmos, who are, for certain components and systems, the sole suppliers to Boeing production lines in the US and the Airbus assembly line in Toulouse, France.

For example, Dynamatic builds “flap track beam assemblies” for all 58 single-aisle airliners that Airbus assembles each month. Without the on-time delivery of this crucial system, Airbus’ assembly of A-318, A-319, A-320 and A-321 airliners in France (54 per month) and China (four per month) would grind to a halt.

Indian A&D firms believe that uninterrupted and timely supply remains critical for their credibility. In the US and France, A&D production continues, even as other factories and shops have been shuttered to stop the spread of Covid-19. The US federal government has ordered the A&D industry’s 2.5 million employees to continue reporting for work, after the defence industry lobbied Congress and the Pentagon for a special dispensation on the grounds of national security.

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