GE Aerospace Announces Plans to Nearly Double Supplier Spend In-Country to Help Meet India’s Aviation Industry Growth

• News coincides with first-ever report measuring GE Aerospace's historic impact in India powering country’s future aviation growth. 
• Advanced engine technology and operational reliability help power connectivity across India's growing aviation ecosystem

GE Aerospace (NYSE:GE) today announced plans to nearly double supplier spend in-country from 2025 to 2030 to help meet India’s growing demand for flight and leadership in the aviation industry. The announcement coincided with the release of a new report compiled by Ernst & Young (EY), Powering Progress: GE Aerospace's Economic Impact in India, the first comprehensive assessment of the impact GE Aerospace's four decades in India have had across commercial aviation, defense, manufacturing, and engineering. The report was released at 'India Taking Flight – Aviation, Innovation and the Road to Viksit Bharat 2047', a gathering of industry leaders hosted by GE Aerospace.

India's domestic commercial airlines generated approximately USD $19 billion in revenue in FY26, reflecting the strength of the country's rapidly expanding aviation sector. Through advanced engine technology and high levels of reliability and operational performance, GE Aerospace helps enable the connectivity and efficiency that support an aviation ecosystem sustaining an estimated 370,000 direct jobs.

According to the report, commercial engines made by GE Aerospace and its partners* power the majority of commercial airline operations in India with a fleet of more than 1,400 engines, as of December 2025. Those engines have helped Indian carriers post the world's highest passenger load factor at 88.2% and aircraft utilization rates of 12 to 14 hours per day, well above global figures.

"India’s commercial aviation growth is one of the fastest in the world, and today’s report shows that our commitment here goes far beyond selling engines," said Vikram Rai, CEO, South Asia, GE Aerospace. "It's in the components machined in Pune, the innovation in Bengaluru, and our trusted customers, who are building the next generation of India's aerospace industry. As India works towards its Viksit Bharat ambitions, doubling our spend to grow the supply chain ecosystem will help meet the growing demand."

Positioned for a decade of aviation growth

Government of India estimates project annual domestic passenger traffic will reach 1.1 billion by 2040, up from 340 million in FY26, as the number of airports grows from 163 to more than 350 by 2047.

To meet the demand, India and South Asia will need 3,300 additional aircraft, or 6,600 additional engines, by 2044. In July 2026, IndiGo announced an MoU with CFM International for an order of 1,000+ LEAP-1A engines to power 510 Airbus A320neo Family aircraft, the largest single order ever placed for LEAP engines and a record for CFM International, which also included support in establishing IndiGo’s upcoming engine MRO facility. GE Aerospace and its partner engines are expected to power most of the approximate 1,500 new aircraft already on order with Indian carriers, an opportunity the report values at more than USD $5.5 billion for India's maintenance, repair, and overhaul industry.

A manufacturing base built through sustained investment

GE Aerospace’s flagship facility in Pune was established with an initial investment of USD $200 million. Since 2024, the company has invested nearly USD $55 million to expand automation, enhance precision-manufacturing capabilities and advance workforce development. These investments have strengthened GE Aerospace’s manufacturing capabilities in India, supported by a broader supplier network that includes 17 major domestic partners—including small and medium-sized enterprises - and the Pune facility. GE Aerospace spent roughly USD $200 million on this in-country supply chain in 2025, an investment it plans to double by 2030 to meet increased demand.

Since 2015, roughly 5,000 production associates have graduated from the Pune facility's apprenticeship program, which enrolls 400 to 500 new apprentices each year. In Bengaluru, engineering talent development programs and academic research partnerships, including a flagship joint innovation program with IIT Madras that produced a locally designed and built Micro Turbomachine, continue to strengthen India's aerospace engineering base.

A defense partnership central to self-reliance goals

GE Aerospace's engines are also central to India's defense self-reliance goals. Since 1986, the company has partnered with Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) on LM2500 naval engines and F404-IN20 engines powering India's Tejas Mk1 light combat aircraft, a platform with more than 4,000 engines deployed across 16 countries.

A 2023 memorandum of understanding covers the potential domestic manufacture of F414 engines for the Tejas Mk2 program, pending final agreements and approvals. GE Aerospace has also signed a five-year Performance Based Logistics contract with the Indian Air Force for Apache helicopter engines, and a separate agreement to establish an in-country depot facility for F404-IN20 engines.

Engineering and innovation anchored in Bengaluru

GE Aerospace’s Bengaluru Technology Centre, established in 2000 with an investment of USD $200 million, was among the first research and engineering centres of its kind outside the United States. Since then, it has secured more than 1,000 aviation patents and contributed to the design, development and certification of the GE9X—the world’s most powerful jet engine. Its engineers hold key design responsibilities for the GE90, GP7200, GEnx and GE9X engines, while also playing a pivotal role in the CFM RISE** program, which aims to improve fuel efficiency by 20% while meeting customer expectations for durability. The centre’s Digital Technology team supports GE Aerospace’s global supply chain, MRO and sales operations through the application of artificial intelligence.

Together, these investments reflect four decades of GE Aerospace's commitment to building India's aerospace capability, manufacturing, engineering, and defense self-reliance, in step with the country's own aviation ambitions.

Download the complete report here.

*CFM International, a 50-50 joint company between GE Aerospace and Safran Aircraft Engines

**Revolutionary Innovation for Sustainable Engines (RISE) is a technology demonstration program of CFM International, a 50-50 joint company between GE Aerospace and Safran Aircraft Engines. It is not a product offered for commercial sale.

About GE Aerospace in India

GE Aerospace has been a partner to India's aviation industry for over 40 years, with more than 1,400 GE Aerospace and partner engines in service nationwide, powering major Indian airlines. GE Aerospace’s defense engines and systems also power the Indian Air Force’s Light Combat Aircraft Tejas Mk1 and helicopters, and the Indian Navy’s aircraft carrier battleships and frigates. The Pune manufacturing facility and 17 Indian suppliers play an important role in the company’s global supply chain. Researchers and engineers at the company’s 25-year-old Technology Centre in Bengaluru are building the latest aviation technologies. Learn more about GE Aerospace in India at geaerospace.com/india

Viyona Fintech Enters African Expansion with Tap & Pay SoftPOS Launch in Zimbabwe, Eyes Africa’s $2 Trillion Payments Ecosystem

Viyona Fintech, an NPCI-certified Technology Service Provider (TSP), today announced plans to roll out its Viyona Tap and Pay platform to extend its payment technologies to African markets, positioning Zimbabwe as its initial entry point for sub-Saharan deployment. The company is currently in discussions with the Government of Zimbabwe to support this strategic rollout.

The move aligns with the upcoming rollout of Viyona Tap & Pay, an NFC-based SoftPOS solution designed to turn commercial Android smartphones into contactless payment terminals, eliminating hardware costs for small businesses.

Viyona is timing its regional entry to capitalize on the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe’s ongoing negotiations with NPCI International Payments Ltd (NIPL) to license India’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) technology as a national payment rail. As African central banks seek to adopt "Made in India" public infrastructure, Viyona is stepping in to deliver the companion merchant infrastructure.

In Zimbabwe, Viyona has identified local acquiring banks, PSPs, and merchant networks as target integration partners for its initial African rollout.

"Our focus is providing scalable digital infrastructure that reduces capital expenditure for merchants," said Ravindranath Yarlagadda, Founder & Chief Executive Officer at Viyona Fintech. "Zimbabwe’s high digital payment adoption surpassing ZiG200 billion in monthly electronic transactions makes it an ideal testing ground for Tap & Pay technology before broader regional scaling. We are currently in talks with the Government of Zimbabwe to facilitate this expansion."

The expansion targets Africa's rapidly expanding digital finance market, Africa’s instant payment systems processed approximately $2 trillion in transaction value across 64 billion transactions in 2024, according to AfricaNenda State of Inclusive Instant Payment Systems in Africa 2025 report. The report identified 36 live instant payment systems across 31 countries as of June 2025.

As an established NPCI-certified partner, Viyona brings battle-tested experience in routing and scaling UPI-compliant platforms. This enables the company to offer central banks, acquiring banks, and local payment service providers (PSPs) plug-and-play merchant acceptance technology built to connect natively with NIPL-backed switches.

While national switches handle central clearing, everyday commerce relies on merchant adoption. Viyona’s Tap and Pay platform solves this operational barrier by turning ordinary smartphones into digital terminals, giving micro-merchants immediate access to national payment rails without buying dedicated POS hardware.

Full commercial rollout of Viyona Tap & Pay across India and select African markets will follow standard payment network certifications and regional regulatory clearances.

About Viyona Fintech

Founded in 2022, Hyderabad-based Viyona Fintech builds digital banking infrastructure, switch management systems, and merchant payment technologies. It holds NPCI certifications across UPI Switch, eKYC Setu, IMPS, eNACH, and Bharat Connect. https://viyonafintech.com/

Vertiv Marks AI Infrastructure Milestone with India’s First Direct‑to‑Chip Liquid Cooling Deployment

Secondary Fluid Network (SFN) skid design, engineering & manufacturing capability, and rigorous quality standards support Vertiv India's growing role in the country's liquid cooling market

Vertiv (NYSE: VRT), a global leader in critical digital infrastructure, has successfully delivered India’s first direct-to-chip high-density liquid cooling (HDLC) deployment in collaboration with CapitaLand India Trust (CLINT), Asia’s first India-focused property trust under CapitaLand Investment (CLI), at the CLDC Mumbai 01 Data Center in Airoli, Navi Mumbai. The project leverages Vertiv’s secondary fluid network (SFN) system to support 30 MW of AI workloads for a hyperscale end customer, marking a significant milestone for India’s data centre industry as it moves to liquid cooling to meet the demands of AI infrastructure.

Liquid-based cooling is the fastest-growing segment, accelerating as operators move beyond traditional air cooling to meet the demands of AI-driven, high-density workloads. Central to enabling liquid-based cooling adoption at scale, the closed loop SFN system carries coolant from a facility's cooling infrastructure to the chip level, and is manufactured, tested and commissioned to exacting standards before it can support live IT loads.

“The CapitaLand Investment project, particularly the collaboration, helped us accelerate the development of our manufacturing and engineering capabilities, enabling us to support the growing demands of AI-ready digital infrastructure,” said Vertiv India Managing Director Subhasis Majumdar. “As the Indian market advances toward high-density liquid cooling for hyperscale and data center applications, we see meaningful growth potential and are well positioned to deliver the scale, expertise, and innovation required for these deployments.”

From innovation to India’s first HDLC data center deployment

To meet the scale of the HDLC project, Vertiv built a production facility capable of mass-manufacturing the customized technology loop skids designed to support future large-scale deployments. The facility was also designed to meet stringent standards for protecting sensitive cooling components from contamination.

Vertiv worked closely with CapitaLand Investment, owner and operator of CLDC Mumbai, to develop installation and commissioning (I&C) procedures designed to minimize dust ingress into the technology loop as the SFN skids were installed. Following commissioning, Vertiv demonstrated technology-loop balancing using its innovative SFN-Tab kits, then carried out comprehensive Level 4 (L4) testing at the data centre to validate performance ahead of go-live.

Building Vertiv India’s capability for large-scale liquid cooling

The completion of this project further demonstrates Vertiv’s expertise in developing gigawatt-scale AI infrastructure. It also builds on the relationship between Vertiv and CapitaLand Investment, with both organizations working closely from design through commissioning to bring one of India’s first HDLC facilities to life.

For more information on Vertiv’s leading portfolio of power and thermal management, infrastructure solutions, IT systems, and services for critical digital applications, visit Vertiv.com.

Bengaluru-based Peptris Technologies Gets ₹86 Cr Financial Support Under the RDI Fund of TDB-DST

India has taken a decisive step toward transforming its pharmaceutical innovation ecosystem. The Technology Development Board (TDB) under the Department of Science & Technology (DST) has signed an agreement with Peptris Technologies Pvt. Ltd., Bengaluru, to provide ₹86 crore in financial support under the Research Development and Innovation (RDI) Fund. This investment will accelerate the VIGOR programme, which aims to advance four AI-discovered drug candidates from Technology Readiness Level (TRL)-4 to TRL-6, moving them closer to clinical development.

Peptris Technologies Pvt. Ltd. is a Bengaluru-based health-tech startup founded in 2019 that specializes in AI-powered drug discovery. It leverages proprietary generative AI and unsupervised learning to design optimized molecules, reduce wet lab dependency, and accelerate preclinical development.

In February this year, Peptris raises ₹70 crore Series A funding round led by IAN Alpha Fund, the 2nd in the series of IAN Group’s VC funds. 

The VIGOR Programme: Bench to Clinic

Peptris’ flagship initiative, VIGOR (Advancing AI-Discovered Molecules from Bench to Clinic), represents a structured three-year roadmap to bridge the gap between computational drug discovery and clinical readiness. With a total project cost of ₹172 crore, the programme will focus on:

• PEPR111: Targeting neuromuscular disorders and oncology.
• PEPRX101: Focused on alopecia.
• PEPR202: Addressing neuropathy.
• PEPR112: Designed for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD).

Each candidate will undergo advanced preclinical studies, IND-enabling validation, formulation development, and trial preparation. The financial support will be provided through Optionally Convertible Debt (OCD), ensuring flexibility in funding.

Why AI Matters in Drug Discovery

Artificial intelligence is revolutionizing pharmaceutical research by enabling scientists to:

• Identify molecules with therapeutic potential.
• Investigate disease mechanisms more efficiently.
• Accelerate therapy development through predictive modeling.

However, computational discoveries alone are insufficient. They require rigorous experimental validation, preclinical studies, and structured clinical pathways to become viable therapies. Peptris’ approach combines AI-driven discovery with global CRO networks and established drug-development expertise, ensuring a robust transition from lab to clinic.

Voices from the Partnership

Sh. Rajesh Kumar Pathak, Secretary, TDB:
“The application of artificial intelligence in pharmaceutical research has the potential to transform how new drug candidates are identified and developed. Through the RDI Fund, TDB is supporting technology-intensive programmes to bridge the gap between innovation and clinical development.”

Peptris Technologies Representative: “The support from TDB under the RDI Fund will help us progress our AI-discovered molecules through critical preclinical milestones. Our approach combines AI-driven discovery with experimental validation to address unmet medical needs.”

Strategic Impact

This collaboration is more than a funding initiative—it is a strategic investment in India’s biotech future. By focusing on neuromuscular disorders, oncology, alopecia, neuropathy, and DMD, the programme targets areas with limited treatment options, ensuring innovation is directed where it is most needed.

The VIGOR programme exemplifies how India is positioning itself as a global hub for AI-led healthcare innovation, strengthening its pharmaceutical R&D capabilities and paving the way for next-generation therapeutics.

Inner Sky Labs Unveils Kavach, Raises ₹300 Cr to Scale Physical AI

Ten years in the making, Inner Sky Labs exits stealth and unveils a full stack of foundation models for physical machines: how they sense the world, how they decide what to do — and Kavach, a safety layer that has the final word before anything moves.

Inner Sky Labs today unveiled a complete stack of foundation models that lets machines sense, decide and act safely around people. Every great leap in human productivity has come from a new kind of machine working alongside people: the loom, the steam engine, the industrial robot. Most of the world's economy, by some estimates as much as 80% of global GDP, is created in the physical world, where language models alone fall short. For a construction project in Delhi, a warehouse in Bhiwandi, a farm in Punjab or a car manufacturer in Stuttgart, physical AI means a smarter machine that follows their lead, intelligently takes the strain out of the job and lets their skill go further. A machine that works this close to people must be one they can trust, because a machine's mistake could hurt someone.

The stack gives a machine three things a human has by instinct: the ability to sense what's happening around it, the ability to decide what to do about it, and — critically — an independent safety check to stop any unsafe move.

Alongside the launch, the startup is closing a ₹300 Cr (about $30.9 Mn) funding round involving existing backers YourNest Venture Capital and Keshav R Murugesh, as well as new global investors.

Teaching machines to see, hear and feel

Before a machine can act safely, it has to understand what's actually happening around it — not just see it, but make sense of it the way a person does. Inner Sky Labs' perception models give a machine that understanding: the Drishti series of vision models reads a scene the way a pair of eyes would, the Shruti series of audio models makes sense of sound — a spoken instruction, the crash of something falling — and the Sparsh models give a machine a working sense of touch, so a robotic hand can tell the difference between gripping an egg and gripping a wrench. Put together, a machine stops being a sensor bolted to a motor and starts being something that actually perceives the room it's in.

Teaching machines to decide, and to think ahead

Understanding a room is only half the job — a machine also has to decide what to do next, and good judgment means thinking a step ahead. Inner Sky Labs' action models — Kriya, Prana and Karma — supply generative action intelligence to plan and carry out physical movement — reaching, gripping, walking, flying — and also to predict what happens next: if this arm moves this way, does the box slip, does the person standing nearby step forward. It's the same kind of anticipation a person uses to catch a glass before it tips, built into the machine's decision-making instead of left to reflex.

Kavach: the part of the brain whose only job is to say no

Sensing and deciding well is still not the same as being safe — a machine can understand a room perfectly and still make the wrong call. That's what Kavach — Sanskrit for "shield" — is for: a system that checks every single action a machine is about to take, and has the power to stop it, no matter what the rest of the machine has decided.

Picture a robotic arm about to swing across a factory floor. Before Kavach lets that motion proceed, it checks: is that space clear of people right now, is the planned speed safe for that area, does this action stay inside the zone it's allowed to work in. If the answer to any of those is no, the arm does not move. Not "slows down." Not "flags it for review afterward." The action is blocked before it starts.

A decade of trust, now scaling up

Inner Sky Labs already knows what it means to be trusted with something fragile. It is the company behind Miko, the companion robot that has spent the past ten years engaging and educating children to improve their social-emotional skills and is now in more than 140 countries. An early version of the same safety thinking that has spent a decade deciding what Miko may say to a child is now the foundation deciding what any machine — an industrial arm, a delivery robot, a drone — is allowed to do. In an independent evaluation by BDO’s cyber security practice, Miko's safety system caught every unsafe prompt across seven public AI-safety benchmarks, ahead of four widely used commercial AI models, and ranked first at flagging unsafe AI responses. Full methodology at www.innerskylabs.ai. A decade spent earning a parent's trust with a robot for their child is now the foundation for earning a factory's, a hospital's, and a government's trust with machines that move.

Why this matters beyond one company

As machines move into hospitals, factories, streets and homes, whoever writes the rules a machine lives by decides what that machine is allowed to do near a citizen — and today, most of those rules are written somewhere else, in a language, a legal system and a set of values that aren't their own. Inner Sky Labs' system lets any end customer or authority write its own rules — its own definition of what is safe, in its own legal language — and have a machine obey them, without depending on another company's judgment call. Built and proven in Mumbai out of more than ten years of research by IIT Bombay alumni, this is a technology that lets any country decide for itself what its own machines are allowed to do.

The full stack already runs today inside factories, classrooms and consumer products in millions of homes.

"Every robot company will eventually have to answer one question: why should anyone trust this machine near a person," said Sneh Vaswani, co-founder and chief executive of Inner Sky Labs. "For ten years, our answer was Miko — a robot trusted enough to be left with a child. Today we're answering that same question for every kind of machine, with technology built, tested and proven out of India."

“I’ve advised Sneh and the team since 2016, when they first shared this multi-decade vision with me—long before ‘Physical AI’ was even a category,” said Keshav R. Murugesh, early investor, advisor to Inner Sky Labs, and former Chairperson of NASSCOM. “Today, Physical AI is being called a $50 trillion opportunity. I am proud to see this built in India for the world. Miko was the proof point. This is the scale-up.”

Availability

The platform is available today to qualified partners by invitation, with cloud, on-premise and on-device deployment, including fully offline, air-gapped environments for operators who cannot depend on an outside network. Each model — perception, action and Kavach's safety layer — is available on its own. The company has raised over $80M to drive frontier research from investors including Chiratae Ventures, IvyCap Ventures, YourNest Venture Capital and 360 ONE.

About Inner Sky Labs

Inner Sky Labs is a Mumbai-headquartered company, with offices in the US and the UK, that created the consumer brand Miko, the children's companion robot sold globally. Founded out of IIT Bombay, Inner Sky Labs has spent over a decade building the technology that lets machines sense, decide and act safely around people, and is now bringing that same thinking to industrial robots, drones and machines everywhere.

More at innerskylabs.ai.