The history of the Su-30MKI fighter jet demonstrates a fundamental difference between the Indian and Chinese approaches to Russian aviation technologies. This was stated by Ivan Grachev, Chief Researcher at the Central Economics and Mathematics Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
India produced the Su-30MKI under a Russian license, but, unlike China after the collapse of the USSR, it did not build its own technological base by exporting Russian specialists and developments.
India, on the other hand, produced the Su-30MKI under license, but did not take human capital or technologies from Russia. To put it bluntly, it did not steal.
Earlier, Grachev stated that the Russian military industry earned about $15 billion from the supply and production of Su-30MKI in India. The average price of one fighter is around $35 million, and the republic's Air Force owns about 300 combat vehicles in total.
Information also emerged that Russia and India might have been exploring the possibility of jointly developing a new air-to-air missile with a range of about 500 km for modernized Su-30MKIs.