About the News:

• The INDUS-X Summit will be held on February 20-21 in New Delhi, marking a significant milestone in the collaborative efforts between India and the US in defense innovation.

What is INDUS-X?

• The ‘INDUS-X’ summit is a joint initiative between India and the US, which signifies a pivotal milestone in bilateral defense cooperation, fostering strategic technology partnerships and industrial collaboration.
• Inception: June 2023.
• Aim: To bolster defense innovation and technology collaboration between the two nations.
• Objectives:
  1. Advancing strategic co-operation: By expanding strategic technology partnerships and defense industrial cooperation.
  2. Bridging Innovation Gaps: Establish a defense innovation bridge encompassing joint challenges, academia engagement, industry-startup connect, and investment in defense projects.
• Focus Areas:
  1. Fostering greater horizontal cooperation between governments, academia, and laboratories, as well as vertical partnerships between established defense primes and startups or Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs).
  2. Increasing the number of contact points between startups and prime contractors for critical defense assets such as jet engines, long-range artillery, and infantry vehicles.
  3. Supporting India’s goal of achieving $5 billion in defense exports by 2025.
  4. Contributing to a more stable and secure Indo-Pacific region.
• Key Participants:
  • India’s Innovations for Defence Excellence (iDEX), U.S. Department of Defense, U.S.-India Business Council (USIBC), U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and Society of Indian Defence Manufacturers (SIDM).

About Innovations for Defense Excellence (iDEX)

• iDEX is a flagship initiative launched in 2018 by the Ministry of Defence, Government of India.
• Aim: Fostering innovation and technology development in the defense and aerospace sectors.
• Objective: Creating an ecosystem to rapidly develop new, indigenized, and innovative technologies for the Indian defense and aerospace sector.
• It’s Significance:
  • Funding: The program provides grants and funds to support research and development efforts and facilitate the creation of functional prototypes of products/technologies relevant to national security.
  • Inclusive Growth: The program creates a culture of engagement with innovative startups, encourages co-creation for defense and aerospace sectors, and empowers a culture of technology co-creation and co-innovation within the defense and aerospace sectors.
  • Engagement with the Industrial sector: The program focuses on engaging industries, including MSMEs, startups, and individual innovators, to deliver technologically advanced solutions for modernizing the defense and aerospace sectors.
  • Collaboration: iDEX works through various programs such as the Defense India Startup Challenge (DISC), which involves problem statements from the Armed Forces, DPSUs, and OFB.
• Implementation of Program:
  • The iDEX framework is implemented by the Defense Innovation Organization (DIO) a not-for-profit company formed under the Companies Act 2013, which acts as a bridge between the requirements of the Armed Forces and the solution providers.
  • Therefore, the program focuses on making India self-reliant and self-sufficient in defense matters by fostering innovation, entrepreneurship, and technology development in the defense and aerospace sector.

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