Lockheed Martin ends association with Wipro in network centric warfare project

US defense and aerospace gaint Lockheed Martin's association with Indian IT major Wipro on the network centric warfare (NCW)technology demonstrator project has ended at the end of December 2008. Informed sources said "best fit" issues and delays in C4iSR and NCW procurement plans contributed to the cooperation not being extended. Informed sources said this did not mean that the relationship ended on a sour note. If there were similar projects in future, the two companies could cooperate again. The Indian government insists that an Indian company be the "prime contractor" in any C4ISR and NCW projects which involved the development of propreitory software codes. However, Indian IT companies were yet to reach the level of maturity required to execute large defense standard C4iSR and NCW projects. From India's perspective, it does not want to allow a foreign company get hold of proproeitory codes which could prove detrimental to the country's interests in case political equations with the foreign company or country change. In fact, no country in the world allows a foreign company to totally develop C4iSR or NCW systems. The Lockheed Martin-Wipro NCW technology demonstrator centre was launched nearly two years ago in Wipro's office in Gurgaon near Delhi. Its purpose was to develop technologies using Lockheed Martin's vast expertise in developing similar systems for the U.S. defense forces and Wipro's experience in IT solutions. However, the partnership venture did not gather the required steam to develop appropriate NCW and C4ISR technologies for the Indian environment. India is reported to have a total C4ISR and NCW requirement exceeding $4 billion. But procurement in these sectors has been relatively slow as compared the procurement of weapons platforms. India wants to modrnize it command and control systems in tune with the procurement of modern weaponry. All modern armies in the world are "network driven" which means the fighting assets such as infantry soldiers, fighter planes and ships are connected with their commanders in real time who direct the course of battle by taking inputs from various sources.