Ahead of US President Joe Biden’s visit to India, officials from the two countries who are drawing closer on strategic issues held the first meeting of the Senior Advisory Group (SAG) of the INDUS-X, the India-US Defence Acceleration Ecosystem, on September 5. The focus was on the Indo-Pacific and in getting the private sector involved in defence initiatives.

“Participants discussed ongoing initiatives to drive innovation and equip both countries' armed forces with the capabilities they need to defend a free and open Indo-Pacific”, a Pentagon Spokesperson Lt. Col. Martin Meiners said.

The meeting was co-chaired virtually by Anurag Bajpai, the joint secretary for Defence Industries Promotion in India’s Defence Ministry and by Lindsey Ford, the US Defence Department’s deputy assistant secretary for South and Southeast Asia and Doug Beck, the director of the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU). 

Meiners said that the SAG “noted efforts by private investors to generate capital for US and Indian defence and dual-use technology start-ups” and were “committed to facilitating greater two-way flow of capital to support innovation and integration between their respective private defence sectors”.

He said that India’s Innovations for Defense Excellence (iDEX) and DIU announced topics for the first two joint challenges for start-ups that would be on undersea communication and maritime intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance.

Under the challenges to be opened up later this month, start-ups in the two countries will try to “develop technological solutions for shared defence challenges, culminating in financial awards for the most promising technology along with potential procurement opportunities”, Martin said. 

INDUS-X was launched in Washington in June during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s state visit to Washington following a commitment made by National Security Advisors Ajit Doval of India and Jake Sullivan of the US in January 2023 to launch an “Innovation Bridge” to connect US and Indian defence start-ups.

The INDUS-X was a part of the India-US Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology (iCET) .

Last month two programmes under the initiative got underway in the US and in India.

The US Hacking4Allies for and IIT Hyderabad hosted a program for 50 Indian start-ups to equip them to commercialize, recruit talent, and expand, Martin said.

Hacking for Allies is an accelerator programme for foreign companies to work on public sector challenges in areas that the US is interested in.

For the other programme, Pennsylvania State University and IIT Kanpur convened a virtual group of Indian and US academics, government officials, and industry representatives on developing innovation in emerging areas like artificial intelligence (AI), space, and cyber, Martin noted.

The INDUS-X programme announcement in June said that the United States Institute of Peace (USIP), Carnegie India, (USIBC), the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum (USISPF), and the Society of Indian Defense Manufacturers (SIDM) will follow up the implementation of the collaboration agenda and identify barriers to it for the SAG’s consideration.

Martin did not directly mention China, which is the factor driving greater geo-strategic cooperation between India and the US, but spoke of a “free and open Indo-Pacific”, which has emerged as the code word for the challenge posed by Beijing to the two countries.

The China challenge has brought the two democracies together after decades of wariness and Washington also wants to help New Delhi wean itself away from defence dependence on Moscow.

It is also a plus for India considering the way Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is going and the performance of its hardware and the shortages likely to emerge.

Modi and US President Joe Biden set up iCET in 2022 to expand strategic technology partnership and defence industrial cooperation between the two countries.

Biden will be in India September 7-9 to attend the G20 Summit in New Delhi and will also have bilateral talks with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. 

(SAM)