The global car industry is a huge market dominated by many leading auto manufacturers. With a burning desire to advance the industry, many of these manufacturers are venturing India with high hopes and expectations. Here are the top reasons why global car manufacturers target India as their manufacturing, designing or production hub:
Reduced Cost and Time-to-MarketIt is believed that global car manufacturers save on almost 40% to 50% on the total cost of designing and engineering by offshoring the services to India. This is mainly because of availability of low cost and talented engineers. There are good designers and engineers in Europe and Asia but they all establish a strong niche in specific areas and this makes them much more expensive than the Indian engineers. In India, there employee proficiency in different automotive areas that makes them fit for the entire range of car designing and engineering jobs.
Apart from having a relatively lower cost of designing and production, Indian professionals also hold the capability to deliver the maximum output in minimum time period. By sending car manufacturing and designing work to India, car manufacturers get a golden opportunity to establish a 24/7 work schedule due to the time zone difference. This kind of work schedule definitely holds greater advantage for India as an automobile market.
Huge Talent PoolIndia holds the maximum number of well trained and English speaking individuals. Researches and studies have revealed that India had an estimated of 215,000 engineering graduates in the year 2004. According to the National Association of Software and Service Companies, 2005 Strategic Review, among the total engineers in 2004, 112,000 had attained bachelor’s degree, 74,000 had attained engineering degree, and the remaining had attained diploma or degree in electrical, CS, or IT.
Further to that the advancement in educational technologies and means, the number of skilled and talented engineers have add on in numbers as well as quality. The number is still rising with the shifting demographics towards younger generation. Today, with the rising number of graduates, engineering and design services are also gaining momentum, eventually delivering exciting job opportunities to the present day professionals.
Availability of High End Software NeedsWith the growing needs and requirements of the Indian car consumers, the country is progressively growing in terms of capabilities to design, manufacture and produce the best cars. Software companies such as Autodesk and PTC have also established a significant presence in the country and have started local partnership to ensure a readily available resource pool.
Despite of much skepticism, there are car manufacturers like Tata Motors, Maruti Suzuki, and Mahindra & Mahindra who have not only proved their strengths but have also displayed India as one of the strongest automobile market. These OEMs have successfully designed fully indianized car in association with software industry and trained manpower. This displays the proven capability of India outside US, Europe, Japan and Korea to design and manufacture automobiles.
Strong Auto IndustryIndia has a robust auto market coupled with friendly government initiative and policies. Even the auto component manufacturing industry is well-established and supplies auto components to top global OEMs and ancillaries. Global OEMs are also targeting Indian suppliers because they believe that India has better design skills and will gradually evolve into full service suppliers. When it comes to electronics design, India is again positioned in the top numbers because of high numbers and quality of IT talents.
Further, when it comes to government policies and taxes, the Indian Government has announced rebate of 150% in the automotive R&D investments. The Government has also linked with the Indian automotive industry to initiate a project known as National Automotive Testing and R&D Infrastructure Project (NATRIP). This project aims at creating testing, validation and R&D infrastructure in India. With this many car manufacturers have expanded or established their research and design centers in India.