Northrop Grumman, the aeronautics and weapons manufacturer, takes out a full backpage advertisement in the Indian Express. "The launch of a new era in battlespace dominance," it says about its E2-D Hawkeye recon aircraft, which possesses "a new generation of radar systems, integrated communications and cutting edge tools". Alright - but are we supposed to rush out and buy one, to assemble on the living room floor?
I've never seen anything of this sort before: military manufacturers grabbing for eyeballs in the media. I'd understand if it were a newsletter for procurement agents and MoD senior bureaucrats, but I don't see how it profits NG to get the general public pepped up about 'battlespace dominance.'
It is, of course, hot news that India is among the "largest potential growth markets for defense products" - the unnerving phrase belongs to NG's President, John Brooks - and that hundreds of foreign arms manufacturers at this year's Defense Expo have been jostling for the honour of defending India's battlespace. "In for a billion, in for a trillion," as they say in the arms biz, and with India expressing interest in a private-public collaboration to develop ballistic missile defense, there is clearly much more juice in the can ($30 billion in the next five years, says the TOI). Moreover, NG has a competitive advantage in the homeland security sector, which is apparently expected to cost India $9.7 billion by 2016.
Still, we're not talking about consumer durables here - none of this seems to call for a public relations campaign by the Big Guns. I can't help thinking that NG's advertising isn't directed at sales at all, but at making friends with the newspapers. As Arindam Chaudhuri knows, nothing says quid pro quo like a full backpage ad.
* * *
The lingo of defense deals is full of brilliant artifice, beginning with the way arms manufacturers now righteously self-describe as "defense contractors" (because they provide products and services to militaries, different from providing weapons and weapons systems). My favourite is the MoD's use of "most capital intensive" - it makes "most expensive" sound like a good thing.
- Raghu Karnad's blog
- Login or register to post comments
-
maybe there was a deal struck with the congresspeople from DC on a defense funding bill. Oh wait--there are no congresspeople from d.c. ;)
I've seen--and been similarly confused by--defense ads on the DC metro. Again, the vast majority of viewers aren't in the market for a helicopter and presumably the people who do decide which helicopter to buy have better sources of information than a poster in a metro station. Are the margins so high in this business that this sort of advertising helps? Does it somehow fit into an effort to rally broader public support for defense spending?
[...] Original post by pass the roti on the left hand side [...]
Perhaps this is NG's first step in introducing their new line of tupperware to the Indian market. You know, to help Shining Indians make use of their intensive capital.
What's interesting is that they chose such an American way of buying the media on a structural level, rather than the standard Indian business practices of junkets and cash and whatnot (which I've been told don't really work, but then, I don't know of any studies).