Dr. Venkat Srinivas, Vice President & Head, Engineering & Product Development, Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd., Truck & Bus Division, has outlined the advantages of setting up automotive R&D facilities in India, the most important of which are availability of large technical workforce at competitive costs, growing engineering consultancy workforce, and huge investments by Indian OEMs with spill-over / network effects.
In his presentation – “Efficient Conventions & Approaches towards a robust R&D” – made at the CII conference on Automotive R&D Trends in Chennai, he said that the level of ‘Make in India’ R&D for global OEMs prevalent for the past two decades is now accelerating. At the same time, Indian OEMs have also embraced globalisation. They can do so only when their ‘Make for India’ strategy is solid.
He said that, with excellent cost focus, frugal engineering has received its due recognition, while design and integration have become prerequisites to be in the market, and not differentiators. Still, global OEMs have entered the Indian market with greater focus within their organisations on ‘Make in India’, while there are many ‘Indias within India’. GDP, upward economic mobility and infrastructure growth can disruptively change the shares of the above segments. It is also essential not to ignore ‘Make in India’ for global markets.
Dr. Srinivas argued that at the current rate, import of oil will continue, and demand for steel and plastic items will widen further. With upward economic mobility, customers would demand constant improvement in product quality. Side by side, there is greater need to specialise in powertrain fuel technologies, alternate fuel technologies, light weighting technologies at the right value, better relevant in-vehicle connectivity for all segments and better driving experience.
The ultimate solution lies in reinforcing clusters of automotive R&D in NCR, Pune and Chennai which have already emerged as big hubs. An active roadmap for conceptualizing the right technologies with a long-term government policy on alternate fuels, hybrids and vehicle lifecycle, as well as OEMs collaborating with each other for mutual progress has to be worked out, he added.
Dr. Venkat Srinivas is a member of the Senior Management Team at Mahindra Truck and Bus Division. He has 24 years of R&D and management experience in Aerospace and Automotive engineering disciplines. Prior to joining M&M in June 2014, he was Special Director – Product Development at Ashok Leyland Ltd., and a member of the Ashok Leyland Senior Management Team. He holds a B.Tech. from IIT, Madras, India, MS and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Maryland, and an MBA with High Distinction from the Ross School of Business, University of Michigan.