India–Sweden Defence Cooperation: The Race to Turn Trust into Technology

The future of defence will be shaped as much by the precision of a research laboratory as by the resolve of a soldier standing guard. For India and Sweden, that reality is transforming an old relationship into something more consequential, where trust is expected to produce technology, industrial capacity and the ability to sustain both.

The latest India–Sweden Joint Working Group on defence cooperation in New Delhi therefore deserves attention beyond the language of diplomatic meetings. Its focus on defence innovation, operationalising the newly established Strategic Partnership and deepening industrial cooperation comes at a moment when both countries are trying to build greater resilience into their security systems.

The larger question is straightforward. Can India and Sweden move from being trusted partners to becoming technology partners whose cooperation produces capabilities that neither side could develop as effectively alone?

A New Phase

The timing of this collaboration matters. In May 2026, India and Sweden elevated their longstanding relationship to a Strategic Partnership built around four pillars, including security, next-generation economic cooperation, emerging technologies and trusted connectivity. The accompanying Joint Action Plan for 2026–2030 gives that political decision an institutional framework, changing the meaning of defence cooperation.

Political warmth can sustain a relationship for years, but defence partnerships are eventually judged by what happens inside factories, laboratories and procurement systems. Strategic autonomy cannot be sustained on ambition alone. It requires the technology to act and the industrial capacity to endure.

The latest JWG, co-chaired by Meera Mohanty, Joint Secretary, Planning and Coordination, Department of Defence Production, and Brigadier General Dennis Hedstrom of Sweden’s Ministry of Defence, reflects that shift. Discussions centred on defence innovation, implementation of the Strategic Partnership and stronger defence industrial cooperation, while the Swedish delegation also engaged India’s Department of Defence Production.

Such institutional detail matters because it places the relationship closer to the machinery of production. The conversation is moving towards the difficult territory where technology has to become manufacturable, supply chains have to become dependable, and cooperation has to survive changes in individual programmes.

Sweden Meets India’s Needs

Sweden is an unusual defence partner for India because its value extends well beyond the equipment it can offer. It has built a sophisticated innovation ecosystem around aerospace, sensors, telecommunications, advanced manufacturing and defence technology, while India brings scale, engineering talent, a large industrial base and an ambitious domestic defence sector.

The two economies are already deeply connected. Bilateral trade reached USD 6.96 billion in 2024, while around 280 Swedish companies have a business presence in India. That means defence cooperation is developing inside an existing industrial relationship rather than being constructed from scratch.

This distinction is important. A country that only buys foreign defence equipment acquires a capability. A country that participates in its design, manufacturing, maintenance and future upgrades begins to acquire an ecosystem.

The Saab experience offers a useful glimpse of that transition. Saab’s Carl-Gustaf system has been associated with the Indian Army since the 1970s, but the relationship has moved considerably further. Saab is establishing its first Carl-Gustaf manufacturing facility outside Sweden in Haryana, with advanced manufacturing processes and Indian suppliers integrated into the production chain.

There is also a broader Saab–Adani collaboration dating back to 2017, aimed at developing aerospace and defence manufacturing capabilities in India. The important lesson, however, is larger than any single corporate partnership. The Carl-Gustaf facility itself is wholly owned by Saab and illustrates how foreign technology can become part of India’s domestic manufacturing ecosystem.

This is where autonomy becomes tangible. It begins when a system can be made in India, supported in India and eventually improved through Indian industrial and engineering capabilities.

Innovation Leads the Way

Defence technology is also changing faster than traditional procurement cycles were designed to handle. Artificial intelligence, cyber capabilities, autonomous systems, advanced communications and sophisticated sensing technologies are altering how militaries collect information, make decisions and operate across domains.

India and Sweden have recognised that wider technological convergence. Their Strategic Partnership places emerging technologies and trusted connectivity alongside security, while the two governments have also agreed to strengthen cooperation through initiatives such as the Sweden–India Technology and Artificial Intelligence Corridor.

This creates an important opportunity for defence cooperation because military innovation depends on technologies developed outside traditional defence companies. A breakthrough in communications can influence battlefield connectivity. Advances in artificial intelligence can alter intelligence analysis. Developments in advanced manufacturing can change how quickly a military replaces or upgrades critical equipment.

The dividing line between civilian innovation and defence technology is therefore becoming thinner. India’s expanding technology ecosystem and Sweden’s long-established research and engineering strengths could complement each other particularly well if cooperation is structured around joint development rather than simple procurement. It is also why industrial policy matters to this relationship as much as diplomacy does.

Cybersecurity is Enhancing the Battlefield

The security conversation is widening in another direction. The Strategic Partnership explicitly includes stronger cooperation on cyber issues, economic security, supply chains and counterterrorism, reflecting the fact that national security can now be disrupted without a conventional attack on territory.

A cyberattack on a communications network, a disruption of a critical supply chain or the compromise of sensitive industrial data can have consequences far beyond the computer systems initially targeted. Defence establishments therefore depend on the resilience of the technological and industrial networks surrounding them.

For India and Sweden, cybersecurity can become one of the most practical bridges between their economic and defence relationships. Both countries have a reason to protect the innovation ecosystems they are trying to deepen.

There is also a deeper logic. Sweden’s military-defence appropriations are set to reach SEK 175 billion in 2026, an 18 percent increase from 2025. This reflects a broader European security environment in which defence capability, industrial readiness and technological resilience are receiving renewed attention.

India, meanwhile, is pursuing greater domestic defence production while seeking access to advanced global technologies. The two trajectories create space for cooperation that is more durable than a conventional buyer-seller arrangement.

Transforming Trust Into Capability

India and Sweden have something many defence relationships spend years trying to establish: institutional trust. They now have a Strategic Partnership, an implementation plan and a growing commercial ecosystem that can support deeper technological cooperation. However, trust becomes crucial only when it creates capability.

The Saab–Carl-Gustaf experience shows what that transformation can look like, from a system long associated with the Indian military to a manufacturing capability embedded in India. The next generation of cooperation will need to go further, into research, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, advanced manufacturing and technologies that may not yet have obvious names on procurement lists.

That is the real opportunity before the two countries. India can offer scale and a capable industrial base. Sweden can bring specialised technological expertise and a culture of innovation shaped by decades of advanced engineering. The question is whether they can connect those strengths quickly enough.

A partnership becomes crucial when it creates capability, not when it acquires another ceremonial adjective. India and Sweden have now given their relationship the political architecture to move forward. The harder task is to fill that architecture with laboratories, factories, engineers and technologies that can withstand the test of a changing security environment.

The next chapter of India–Sweden defence cooperation will therefore not be written in bulletins alone. It will be written on production floors, inside research centres and eventually in the systems that protect both countries. That is where trust either becomes real capability or remains only a promising idea.