Foreigners drive auto R&D, engineering in motown
NEW DELHI: Tim Leverton, 57, joined Tata Motors in 2010 to realise a vision he shared with then chairman Ratan Tata and managing director Ravi Kant — to reinvent the firm and turn it into a global giant.
Before joining Tata Motors, Leverton was chief engineer of Rolls-Royce’s Phantom project, and group engineering director at JCB Inc, the US-based maker of earth-moving equipment.
Markus Braunsperger, 53, joined Hero MotoCorp Ltd in 2014 to tackle a technology challenge at India’s largest maker of two-wheelers, leaving behind a sterling career as the research and development (R&D) head at BMW Motorrad, the twowheeler unit of the Munichbased luxury carmaker.
Leverton and Braunsperger are part of a pool of top foreign R&D executives, who are joining Indian automakers to help improve products. With years of experience behind them, these men have been tasked with re-engineering the product line-up and enhancing the public image of their Indian employers.
Braunsperger, who worked on a whole range of BMW products, is chief technology officer at Hero MotoCorp. He gets the opportunity to work on products priced at a fraction of what a BMW 3 Series costs. “That’s the challenge that attracted me the most,” Braunsperger said.
Leverton has spent over 30 years in the auto industry and spearheaded the development of nine vehicles during his career. He joined Tata Motors as the head of advanced engineering.
“I came into the company as part of a process that was being led by (Ratan) Tata and Ravi Kant at that time. It was a process of reinvention of the company. To be able to deliver that, they had to change the company. We had to do something different, and I had the chance to contribute to that,” Leverton said.
Ratan Tata retired in 2012 and is now chairman emeritus of the Tata Group; Kant retired in mid2014. In 2008, Tata Motors acquired Jaguar Land Rover.
For foreign engineers, the opportunity is to work in India and on new product designs, which could be deployed in other emerging markets as well, dovetailed with their own markets reaching a saturation point.
The overseas talent pool in the Indian auto industry cuts across nationalities. There are German, Japanese, Austrian, French and American engineers at work.
There’s Malo Le Masson, Hero’s head of product planning, who joined from Nissan Motor’s Infiniti division, where he served as the global head of products (long-term strategy); Markus Feichtner, former executive director at Austrian engine maker AVL, is the head of engineering development at Hero.
Mark Wells of Xenophya and Steve Harris of Harris Performance Products are global names in concept motorcycle designs. They work for Royal Enfield, which acquired their companies.
Karl-Heinz Servos worked at Volkswagen AG and was was instrumental in developing the Touareg SUV. He is responsible for joint development of products between Tata Motors and JLR, the first of which is expected in 2018.
The list is long. Hero managed to retain Hiroyuki Miyo, who designed the first-generation Splendour motorcycle, when it parted ways with Honda Motor Co. in 2010, ending a 26-year partnership.
Another Japanese, Mitsuo Kitada, serves as the head of vehicle integration and chassis development at Hero. He had earlier worked at Honda and Yamaha Motor and has invented and patented systems, including vehicle-starting clutch-control device, a drive system for automobiles and an engine-cooling system for motorcycles.
Indian companies gain a lot from hiring expats, according to Anil Sharma, principal analyst at consulting firm IHS Automotive. “It is important in terms of sensitising their own workforce about what’s happening globally. It is a game-changer.”
INDIA WAS EARLIER A SELLERS’ MARKET AND DESIGN WAS NOT A PRIORITY. BUT THINGS CHANGED WITH THE MARKET GROWING FROM 5.2 MN UNITS IN 200001 TO 20.46 MN IN 201516.