Sunita Tools began as a specialist in the giant steel foundation plates and precision-machined blocks that every factory needs to build its own products - what the company calls the “food” of manufacturing - and after more than three decades quietly becoming India’s largest mould-base maker, it is now channelling that precision-engineering DNA into a high-stakes second act: making empty artillery shells, aerospace components, and naval systems for defence customers in India and NATO countries. Incorporated in 1988 and listed on the BSE SME Platform in 2023, the company operates from its main factory in Vasai, Maharashtra, and has expanded through a series of subsidiary acquisitions that brought in machining shops, a defence vendor registration, a naval retrofitting business, and a US manufacturing outpost - all while remaining long-term debt-free at the parent level. The recurring approach is to buy or partner with established proprietorships that already hold vendor approvals and technical know-how, then scale them with capital and management bandwidth - a pattern that repeats across every new business line. # Business segments Three engines at different stages - a precision-industrial cash cow, a defence-manufacturing bet now entering production, and a collection of subsidiary machining and niche-manufacturing businesses that extend the group’s reach into aerospace, naval, and US markets - each built by acquiring existing expertise and scaling it. ## 1. Precision mould bases and ground plates: the original factory-floor workhorse **Every moulding and stamping factory needs a flat, perfectly machined steel foundation to mount its tools on, and Sunita Tools has been India’s largest supplier of those foundations by both volume and value.** - **The “food” of manufacturing** - the company makes ground plates, mould bases, die sets, and CNC-machined components that other manufacturers use for cutting, boring, and drilling; without them, production lines in automotive, pharmaceuticals, electronics, and consumer goods cannot run. - **Cheaper steel than rivals** - it buys steel plates directly from mills like ArcelorMittal and Jindal, bypassing distributors and saving a 5-10% margin, and pays with letters of credit that give it favourable credit terms. - **The biggest machines in the industry** - during FY24 it added eight CNC machines including what it describes as the largest horizontal machining centres, surface grinders, and deep-hole drilling machines in India’s mould-base industry, and in April 2024 it installed a 20-tonne-capacity machine with a 2500 x 1500 x 800mm work area. - **No single customer calls the shots** - since 2013, a strict policy caps any one industry vertical at 25% of total sales, so a downturn in autos or pharma cannot sink the business. - **Export agents in place, orders starting** - it has appointed distributor agents in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait, and the USA, with Gulf-region orders expected from calendar year 2025 once embassy and economic-council registrations are complete. ## 2. Empty artillery shells: the defence bet now entering production **The company is building a dedicated line to manufacture empty 155mm M107 artillery-shell bodies to NATO specifications, with two letters of intent for 200,000 shells already in hand and a third interim sales agreement for 240,000 shells signed.** - **A hollow steel projectile, made to military specs** - the 155mm M107 shell is a 35 kg C45/C60 steel body with a copper gilding-metal rotating band and a welded base closure, supplied empty and unfilled; manufacturing involves hot forging, heat treatment, machining, ultrasonic and magnetic-particle testing, and online tracking. - **Bought the plant and the know-how** - in May 2025 it purchased the non-functioning artillery-shell plant of T S Kisan & Co., including three critical hydraulic presses, and brought on board Mr. Tarun Thapar, who has been making empty shells in the private sector since 1996 and was among the first to do so in India. - **Line 1 ready, two more coming** - the Faridabad factory has Line 1 installed with capacity of 10,000 shells per month, and the company has announced an expansion to three lines totalling 360,000 shells per annum within two years, backed by a technology partnership with a UK-based press-and-die design firm and a planned investment of about Rs. 126 Crore. - **Orders waiting at the gate** - a major letter of intent from a Far Eastern defence supplier covers 100,000 shells with an end-user certificate from that country’s Ministry of Defence, and a second LOI from a NATO country covers another 100,000 shells with supply starting at 10,000 pieces per export batch from Q3 2026. ## 3. Subsidiary machining, naval, and US manufacturing: acquired expertise, now scaling **Through a series of majority-stake acquisitions, the company has added precision machining for fighter-jet and missile parts, a naval ship-retrofitting business with a Rs. 20-crore-plus order book, and a US grease-cartridge factory with patented recycled-plastic packaging.** - **Aerospace machining via two Indian subsidiaries** - Sunita Leoquip Aerospace (55% owned, Ahmedabad) and Sunita Imperial Aerospace (59% owned) were formed to take over existing sole-proprietorship machining shops; together they bring capabilities in machining Tejas cockpit structures, Prithvi Missile noses, and fighter-jet base frames, with the Imperial business alone having pre-acquisition sales of about Rs. 4 crore. - **Naval defence with an active order book** - the 51% stake in Hyprix Avisan Global Tech Private Limited and Avisan Engineering Enterprises, acquired in November 2025, brought combined FY25 sales of over Rs. 6.27 crore and an order book above Rs. 20.53 crore from clients including the Navy Weapons Department, Hindustan Shipyard, Goa Shipyard, Cummins, and L&T, covering work such as installing weapons systems on naval ships and replacing the main surveillance radar on INS Vikrant. - **A US factory making patented grease cartridges** - through Sunita Defence Inc., the company acquired 51% of New Mold Innovations LLC in Kentucky, which manufactures LeakLock™ grease cartridges from 100% post-consumer recycled HDPE and fills them with aerospace-grade grease; installed capacity is over 12 million cartridges per year at an average selling price of over USD 3.2 each, and the business has already been approved as a vendor by a Virginia farm cooperative with over 300,000 members and 1,200 retail outlets. - **Smart-weapon R&D in the pipeline** - a minority stake in Hyprix Aviation, a startup developing course-correcting fuses and precision guidance kits that retrofit into existing shells, plus in-house work on a loitering weapon with a 60 km range and 2.7 kg payload, point to a future beyond empty shells. # Group structure and partners **The listed parent company controls a growing constellation of majority-owned operating subsidiaries in India and the US, each acquired from an existing proprietor who stayed on as a minority partner, and is supported by a network of marketing agents and strategic MOUs across defence markets.** - Sunita Tools Ltd is the BSE SME-listed parent, operating the mould-base and artillery-shell divisions directly from its Vasai and Faridabad factories. - Indian subsidiaries include Sunita Leoquip Aerospace (55%), Sunita Imperial Aerospace (59%), Tripathi Aerotech and Weapons Manufacturing (55%), and Hyprix Avisan Global Tech Private Limited and Avisan Engineering Enterprises (51%) - each formed or acquired to take over an existing proprietorship with defence or aerospace vendor registrations. - The US subsidiary, Sunita Defence Inc. (100%), was incorporated in Wyoming in March 2026 and holds the 51% stake in New Mold Innovations LLC; it operates a full-time office in Chicago and is led by Mr. Abheshek Satish Pandey as President. - Strategic MOUs and agency agreements span Israel (PIM** Ltd, an Israeli defence company regulated by the Israel Ministry of Defence), the Middle East, and the USA, covering order facilitation, government liaison, and technology transfer for artillery-shell production.