Page 7 - MRO Business Today 15th June 2024 Issue for Website

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW

of scales can be obtained at lower cost
and in quick time.

Q - Can you explain how HAL’s civil
MRO vision is in sync with India’s At-
manirbhar Bharat vision?
Ans: The convergence Mission by
Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) aims
to cross-utilize the assets of Defence
and Civil aviation Industries thereby
achieving economies of scale and quick
turnaround time for establishing new
MRO capabilities by utilizing the share-
able resources and infrastructure of
both civil and defence. The convergence
Mission is in sync with the AatmaNirb-
har Bharat Abhiyan which seeks to make
years. We will leverage our existing able units/components with a minimum India a Global MRO hub enabling self-
experience, expertise and infrastructure lead time to the airlines. That is where reliance in MRO.
of MRO of components and Engines for HAL Nasik will play a vital role in solv- HAL is playing an important role in
defence fleet. As MRO of components ing the supply chain issues and achiev- realizing the goals of the convergence
cannot be done without the support of ing lower TAT and cost by creating pool and establishing an MRO hub at HAL Na-
OEMs, we have also initiated steps to of parts and local repair service center. sik. We have offered our infrastructure
collaborate with the OEMs of compo- like machinery, runway, Hangars, skilled
nents for Civil fleet. Q - Why, according to you is Indian manpower etc for cross utilization by
MRO sector still struggling? How will the third party MROs. In the process re-
Q - MRO industry is facing a major HAL help in boosting the overall MRO nowned third-party MROs have collabo-
problem of lack of spares and supply ecosystem of India. rated with us to establish the capabili-
chain issues. Your views. Ans: Earlier, there existed many policy ties in the country. This is resulting into
Ans: Supply chain issues are some of based barriers due to which the MROs a quick transition of our infrastructure
the important and crucial reasons for faced quite a many challenges. However for use by MRO players. Regulatory ap-
driving high TAT and high cost of avail- policy actions initiated by Govt of India provals have been obtained at a faster
ability for making a civil aircraft service- towards making India a global MRO hub pace as already various infrastructure
able. With the ongoing global scenario have enabled creation of a facilitative of defence is available which could be
post corona pandemic, the demand arrangement. According to me, the MRO quickly transformed to cater for civil
has substantially outpaced the supply. sector is still struggling because of the aviation work.
The demand supply gap has further following reasons:
enhanced by component obsolescence, a. Non-availability of a robust supply Q - Besides the Nasik facility are you
non-availability of regional repair cen- chain for spares and parts. planning to set up MRO facilities in oth-
ters and so on. Component piece parts b. Non-sharing of Technology by OEMs er parts of India? Can you very briefly
and Engine Hot Section are some of the for component MRO. share the expansion plan?
domains where supply chain issues are c. Capital-intensive nature of compo- Ans: Our Nasik facility is a state of art
more prominent. nent MRO coupled with non-avail- facility, which is providing a compre-
So today an aircraft can remain ability of economies of scales. hensive support to its defence custom-
grounded for a spare part or component ers for more than 75 years. With its
for a period of more than 3-4 weeks. HAL as you know is an organization, modern infrastructure, hangars, machin-
And I think this is not acceptable for which strives to achieve self-reliance eries and technical expertise coupled
the aviation ecosystem of our country. in whatever product it makes. HAL has with its well-connected airport, it has
If we were having repair/manufactur- developed a considerable and credible the great potential to become a MRO
ing facility for that component/part in defence ecosystem in the country. We hub in the country. Based on possibili-
India we could have easily avoided such desire to follow the same philosophy ties and business opportunities it can
a situation. Major operators and MROs in the Civil Aviation as well. We wish to be expanded to other locations as well.
delve on keeping high inventory for catalyze the civil MRO ecosystem in the
spares and rotables, which is a very high country so that it becomes capable of Q - Your view of the current civil MRO
cost option. That is where we believe supporting the airlines on its own. We scenario in India.
we need a MRO hub or centre in India have offered our defence infrastructure Ans: The Civil Aviation growth rate in
which will have the full capability in and machineries for cross utilization India is 7-8% per year as compared to
terms of providing spares and service- by civil aerospace so that economies worldwide growth rate of 4-5%. There

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