EADS to open R&D centre in Bangalore, to employ 200 engineers

New Delhi, Feb 16 (PTI) European military consortium
EADS Defence and Security Tuesday said it will open a research
and development centre in India's southern city Bangalore
within two years that will provide employment to 200 Indian
engineers.
The R&D centre would come up irrespective of the
result of EADS' bids for the USD 10 billion Medium Multi-Role
Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) tenders, EADS Defence and Security
Chief Executive Officer (Military Air Systems) Bernhard
Gerwert told PTI at the DefExpo here.
"EADS looks at India not in short term goals. We
already have a EADS Airbus Engineering Centre at Bangalore.
The target is to shift some of our R&D units from Europe to
Bangalore and set up a new R&D centre here to employ up to 200
engineers," Gerwert said.
The MMRCA deal entails that the successful bidder should
plough back 50 per cent of the contract amount back into India
under the offsets clause.
EADS' Eurofighter Typhoon, a swing-role combat jet
produced by Germany, Italy, Britain and Spanish companies, is
competing in the bid and is scheduled to go in for flight
trials in Bangalore beginning next week.
The fighter jet, which is already in service with
British, Spanish, Italian, German, Austrian and Saudi Arabian
air force, would undergo weapons trials in Germany and Britain
later this year. PTI