Eurojet's India Hopes Fade

Typhoon at Laage AFB, Germany | Photo / Shiv Aroor
India's selection of the Rafale constitutes a major blow to EADS, but little or nothing has been said about its implications for Eurojet, the four nation cooperative entity that builds the EJ200 turbofan that powers the Typhoon. With the Typhoon losing out in the MMRCA, it now appears likely that Eurojet Turbo GmbH will never do business with India.

In September 2010, the Indian government announced that it had chosen the GE F414 to power the indigenous Tejas Mk.2, a huge disappointment for Eurojet, which had been confident of upstaging its American rival. I visited Eurojet headquarters in Hallbergmoos, Germany nine months before that, and the company had been quite confident that it would beat General Electric.

While India does a fair bit of business with Rolls-Royce -- which has a maximum 34 per cent production share in the Eurojet consortium -- it has little or nothing to do with Avio, MTU Aero Engines and ITP, the other three partners. As things stand, the EJ200 turbofan may now never power an aircraft for India.

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