Kaveri in Context: Comparative Lessons from International Fighter Aero-Engine Programmes and the Road to AMCA

Abstract

India’s Kaveri programme, launched in the 1980s to power the LCA Tejas (Light Combat Aircraft, Tejas), may have fallen short of the airframe’s wet-thrust requirement, yet throughout its 35-year development, it has created durable assets: a running core, validated dry-engine and maritime derivatives, altitude-test competence, and an emergent private supplier base. This paper interprets Kaveri as unfinished capacity rather than programme failure. Framed by the historical reality that fighter propulsion matures through failure-rich iteration rather than linear research and development, the Kaveri programme’s oscillation, vibration, and weight-growth episodes are typical of engines at the technological frontier. The paper argues that fighter aero-engine programmes should be understood as dynamic innovation systems whose outcomes depend more on ecosystem architecture than single-programme performance. Building on this base, we propose a two-lane “Road to AMCA”: safeguard airframe schedules with a proven interim core while a time-boxed spiral drives toward a next-generation indigenous engine, funded as a portfolio with explicit reliability gates and process-oriented collaboration. The paper integrates technical evidence and certification lessons to show that programme design across funding continuity, supplier development, certification discipline, and collaboration structure can convert Kaveri’s learning into credible Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA) power, faster.