The DRDO Industry Synergy Meet, styled VIMARSH 2026, saw Defence Minister Rajnath Singh unveil a clutch of new policy measures for micro, small and medium enterprises and deep tech start ups in New Delhi on Tuesday.

The initiatives include a framework meant to lower technical and financial entry barriers for MSMEs and deep tech start ups, offering direct funding, incubation support and dedicated access to DRDO testing facilities. A separate framework to share DRDO developed software source codes with licensee industries was also launched, aimed at accelerating software defined defence capabilities and easing obsolescence management.


DRDO Industry Synergy Meet nets nine technology transfers

Nine Licensing Agreements for Transfer of Technology were handed over to 13 manufacturing partners at the meet, enabling commercial production of DRDO developed systems. Strategic MoUs were also exchanged with the Society of Indian Defence Manufacturers and Laghu Udyog Bharati to expand industry outreach and widen grassroots participation.

DRDO also signed a contract with the Quality Council of India for a second version of its System for Advance Manufacturing Assessment and Rating, built to benchmark the manufacturing maturity of domestic defence enterprises.

The Defence Minister told the gathering that DRDO industry collaboration should no longer stop at production, arguing it needs to stretch across research, design, testing, certification and manufacturing if India is to become a global hub for defence manufacturing. DRDO possesses knowledge and technology, the industry has scale and manufacturing capability, start ups bring innovation and agility, and the youth hold the dream of a New India, he said, adding that when these four forces converge and move forward together, no goal is impossible.



Support framework targets funding and testing access

The new support framework promises direct funding and incubation, along with access to DRDO's testing infrastructure, addressing a gap MSMEs and start ups have flagged at past outreach events such as a defence procurement seminar HQ IDS and CENJOWS held for over 150 MSMEs and start ups earlier this year.

DRDO's own regional test and evaluation nodes, including the Defence Technology and Test Centre in Lucknow, already offer some of the modelling and prototyping support the framework seeks to formalise on a wider scale nationally.

Reforms since 2014 set the stage

The Defence Minister listed the reforms rolled out over the past few years, including notification of Positive Indigenisation Lists, the Make in India initiative, iDEX and ADITI, and a decision to allocate 25 percent of the defence research and development budget to the private sector, details carried in the official Ministry of Defence release on the meet.

The Defence Minister framed the day's announcements within the wider Viksit Bharat goal, describing it as building a nation that is economically strong, technologically self reliant, socially inclusive, environmentally sustainable and strategically secure, rather than economic strength alone.


Grants are being provided to start ups through the Technology Development Fund, he said, with several technologies having already reached the production stage. iDEX, he added, has created a new ecosystem for defence innovation where start ups build solutions around actual operational requirements.

The Aatmanirbhar Bharat push has separately shaped a wave of industry tie ups with foreign partners, among them an SIDM agreement with Belgium's BSDI signed at a CEOs Roundtable earlier this month. He set out a 2047 goal of Aatmanirbharta in critical technologies, a sharp rise in indigenous content, multi fold growth in defence exports and a stronger Indian footprint in global supply chains.

Defence Secretary cites scale already reached

Speaking after the Defence Minister, Defence Secretary and DRDO Chairman Rajesh Kumar Singh said VIMARSH 2026, built around the theme Varta se Vikas, was designed to align commercial innovation with national defence readiness and pull private capability into the core of the defence ecosystem. This forum serves as a key vehicle for transforming the national security framework from a mere transactional buyer-seller relationship into a collaborative, co-created technology ecosystem, he said.

He added that the expansion of technology transfer has helped establish parallel production lines and eased constraints that once limited India's manufacturing base. More than 2,300 Technology Transfers have been handed to over 1,100 industries to date, and DRDO has now made technologies tied to around 50 missiles available to industry, he said.

Book and outsourcing guidelines round out the day

The DRDO Industry Synergy Meet also saw the release of a book titled Defence Systems for Resilient Bharat, Advancing Aatmanirbharta in Defence, compiling DRDO systems developed across its technology clusters between 2014 and 2026, alongside new guidelines for Human Resource Outsourcing Service Contracts across DRDO labs.

Secretary (Defence Production) Sanjeev Kumar, Secretary (Defence Finance) Vishvajit Sahay and Distinguished Scientist and Director General (Production Coordination and Services Interaction) Dr (Smt) Chandrika Kaushik were present.

Directors General of DRDO's technological clusters, covering aeronautical systems, missiles, armaments, microelectronics and naval systems, outlined technical roadmaps during dedicated sessions. A separate panel brought together DRDO, the Department of Defence Production and the armed forces to discuss faster technology absorption and quicker induction of indigenous systems into service.

More than 250 defence industry leaders and senior officials attended, with the Secretary of the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade also present.