23 More Firms Including Ideaforge, Garuda Aerospace, Adani-Elbit Selected Under Drone PLI Scheme

The Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) has released the second provisional list of 23 beneficiaries under the Production-Linked Incentive (PLI) Scheme for drone and drone components, an official release said on Wednesday (6 July).

These include 12 drone manufacturers and 11 drone component manufacturers.

The ministry invited applications from eligible manufacturers on 4 May 2022 and the last date for submission was 20 May 2022.

The provisional list of PLI beneficiaries has been prepared on the basis of the unaudited financial results for 2021-22 and other information, the Ministry of Civil Aviation said in a release.

The shortlisted beneficiaries have crossed the eligibility criteria related to sales revenue and value addition in FY 2021-22.

The shortlisted drone manufacturers are:

1. Aarav Unmanned Systems, Bengaluru, Karnataka

2. Asteria Aerospace, Bengaluru, Karnataka

3. Dhaksha Unmanned Systems, Chennai, Tamil Nadu

4. EndureAir Systems, Noida, Uttar Pradesh

5. Garuda Aerospace, Chennai, Tamil Nadu

6. Ideaforge Technology, Mumbai, Maharashtra

7. IoTechWorld Avigation, Gurugram, Haryana

8. Omnipresent Robot Technologies, Gurugram, Haryana

9. Raphe Mphibr, Noida, Uttar Pradesh

10. Roter Precision Instruments, Roorkee, Uttarakhand

11. Sagar Defence Engineering, Pune, Maharashtra

12. Throttle Aerospace Systems, Bengaluru, Karnataka

The shortlisted drone component manufacturers are:

1. Absolute Composites, Bengaluru, Karnataka

2. Adani-Elbit Advanced Systems India, Hyderabad, Telangana

3. Adroitec Information Systems, New Delhi

4. Alpha Design Technologies, Bengaluru, Karnataka

5. Dynamake Engineering, Hyderabad, Telangana

6. Imaginarium Rapid, Mumbai, Maharashtra

7. SASMOS HET Technologies, Bengaluru, Karnataka

8. Servocontrols Aerospace India, Belagavi, Karnataka

9. Valdel Advanced Technologies, Bengaluru, Karnataka

10. ZMotion Autonomous Systems, Bengaluru, Karnataka

11. Zuppa Geo Navigation Technologies, Chennai, Tamil Nadu

The combined annual sales turnover of the aforementioned companies has increased from Rs 88 crore in FY 2020-21 to Rs 319 crore (unaudited) in FY 2021-22, the ministry said.

The eligibility criteria for the PLI scheme for drones and drone components includes an annual sales turnover of Rs 2 crore for drone companies and Rs 50 lakhs for drone components manufacturers; and value addition of over 40 per cent of sales turnover.

The PLI scheme for drones and drone components was notified on 30 September 2021.

Under the scheme, a total incentive of Rs 120 crore is spread over three financial year which is nearly double the combined turnover of all domestic drone manufacturers in FY2020-21.

The PLI rate is 20 per cent of the value addition which is one of the highest among other PLI scheme.

A unique feature of drone PLI scheme is that the manufacturers who fail to meet the value addition threshold in 2021-22 will be allowed to claim the lost incentive in the subsequent year if they make up the shortfall in 2022-23.