Buying a Training Simulator for an Indian Armed Forces Establishment: A Practical Checklist

Training establishments are increasingly asked to do more training with fewer live-equipment hours. A simulator can help — if it is specified around the training requirement rather than around a vendor’s catalogue. This checklist summarises what we have learned delivering BMP-2 driver, gunnery and drone simulators.

1. Start from the training requirement

• Which platform, which trainees, which syllabus?
• Which tasks consume the most live-equipment time today?
• Which scenarios are unsafe or impractical to repeat live?
• What does “competent” mean — and how is it assessed now?

2. Insist on co-development with your SMEs

Your instructors and subject-matter experts own the doctrine. A good simulator vendor studies the vehicle and procedures, runs an SME workshop, builds a first version and then iterates through instructor review and refinement before deployment. Technology should be controlled by doctrine, not the other way round.

3. Ask to see a working system

Ask for a live demonstration on comparable equipment and for deployment references. You can read about our BMP-2 driver training simulator deployment.

4. Check the instructor station and assessment

• Can instructors create and assign exercises without the vendor?
• Can faults and events be injected in real time?
• Which metrics are captured, and can reports be exported?
• Is there individual and cohort analytics across attempts?

5. Plan hardware and motion sensibly

Static stations deliver the most training per rupee for familiarisation and procedures. Add 3DOF or 6DOF motion where physical cues genuinely matter. Make sure the same software runs across configurations.

6. Prefer indigenous, extensible platforms

An Indian vendor with its own simulation framework can add new vehicles, terrains, procedures and scenarios after installation — and support you locally. VR Astra by Aveera develops all software in India; government buyers can engage us through the applicable procurement channels for their establishment.

7. Pilot first, then scale

Start with one platform and one exercise set, validate it with instructors and trainees, then extend to more vehicles, more establishments and centralised reporting.

Explore our defence simulators or call us to discuss a pilot.