Tembo Classic Engineering Private Limited, a subsidiary of Tembo Global Industries, and Belgium’s New Lachaussée have signed a €50 million (approximately $58 million) agreement to establish a complete ammunition production line in India, announced during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s meeting with Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever. The facility is expected to reach production capacity of approximately 100 million rounds annually, with deliveries scheduled for 2028 and 2029.
What’s Actually Being Supplied
According to Belgian government disclosures, New Lachaussée will supply a full production line for two ammunition calibres, along with tooling for two additional calibres, a broader technology transfer than a single-calibre facility. Modi described defence and security cooperation as having emerged as a key pillar of India-Belgium relations following the talks.
Part of a Coordinated Package, Not a Standalone Deal
The Tembo-Lachaussée agreement was one of several industrial announcements made as part of the same India-Belgium engagement. Separately, Belgium’s Exail and India’s Larsen & Toubro signed an agreement for Exail to supply autonomous underwater toolboxes used to detect, identify and neutralise naval mines to the Indian government. The broader visit also included plans for the Belgian Navy warship Leopold I to visit India in November 2026 and for a batch of Indian officers from the College of Defence Management, Secunderabad, to travel to Belgium the following month, indicating the ammunition deal sits within a wider bilateral defence-cooperation push rather than as an isolated commercial transaction.
The Regulatory and Capability Timeline Behind the Deal
This agreement is the latest step in a sequence that has been building for roughly 15 months. Tembo Global signed an MoU with the Government of Maharashtra at the World Economic Forum in Davos in January 2025 to establish a small arms manufacturing facility. In June 2025, its subsidiary, then called Tembo Defence Products, later renamed Tembo Classic Engineering, received a comfort letter from the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) for 100 acres of land in Amravati, near Nagpur. In January 2026, the company received a state-level Defence Manufacturing Licence from the Government of Maharashtra. In April 2026, it secured a licence from India’s Ministry of Home Affairs to manufacture ammunition of various calibres, marking formal entry into regulated arms production. This September’s agreement with New Lachaussée is the point at which that regulatory groundwork converts into an actual, specified production line with delivery dates attached.
Company Context
Tembo Global Industries, per Managing Director Sanjay Patel, brings four decades of experience in precision engineering, machining, fabrication, quality control and process engineering to its defence manufacturing entry, capabilities the company has said are directly relevant to the sector’s stringent production requirements. Patel described the Ministry of Home Affairs licence as validating the company’s capabilities and said Tembo intends to pursue opportunities in both domestic and international defence markets going forward.
Why the Production Line, Specifically, Matters
Defence-grade ammunition manufacturing depends on more than final assembly, it requires specialised machinery, tooling calibrated to exact ballistic and dimensional tolerances, established process control, testing and quality-assurance systems, and the ability to sustain output consistency across very high volumes over multiple years. A technology partner like New Lachaussée, which specialises specifically in ammunition production machinery, supplies the equipment and process expertise; Tembo’s role is to execute and operate that capability domestically. This division of international machinery and process technology paired with Indian engineering and project execution reflects a structure increasingly visible across India’s broader defence manufacturing sector, where technology transfer agreements are paired with domestic execution capability rather than either side attempting to build the full chain independently.