Bosch to revamp Indian facilities
Bosch will invest Rs.1700 crores in India to revamp its facilities.
Bosch will invest Rs.1700 crores in India to revamp its facilities.
Entering India in 1922 with Illies & Company setting up a sales office in Kolkata (then Calcutta), Bosch will invest Rs.1700 crores in India over the next three years. Setting up its own manufacturing facility at Bangalore in 1951, the Group is banking on the signs of recovery the Indian automotive market, and especially the CV market, is showing. Confident of a positive development over the mid-term, Bosch will direct the Rs.1700 crores investment to meet the rising demand for tailored solutions. Announced Volkmar Denner, Chairman, Board of Management, Bosch Group, that the investment rides on the rise in Indian economy and the tremendous market potential. “To meet the rising demand with tailored solutions and expand India’s strong role in our global network, we will invest Rs.1700 crore over the next three years,” he mentioned.
A major share of the investment will go into the expansion of Bosch’s smart campus in Adugodi, Bangalore. A share of the investment would also go into modernising the manufacturing facilities in the country. Said Denner, “In India, the transformation of Bosch into a leading IoT player is quite evident. We have been investing heavily to drive this forward. Our Adugodi location is being revamped from a manufacturing facility into a technology hub.” Bosch has over the last three years invested over Rs.370 crores
in India to create the smart campus at Adugodi, Bangalore. It is home to 3650 of its 18,000 engineers in India. An additional investment of Rs.600 crores is planned to expand the Adugodi campus. “In terms of new business, last year we set up a state-of-the-art artificial intelligence center here in Bengaluru, and our newly established Connected Mobility Solutions division is active in India too, where it is helping to shape the mobility of the future,” he said.
Bosch has been leveraging its knowledge and experience to arrive at the right technology as far as BSVI and electromobility are concerned. Denner expressed that they will offer the right technology to support India’s plans to achieve BSVI implementation from April 2020, and to adopt elctro-mobility. “The solutions we will offer will be built for Indian conditions,” he added. Of the belief that the IC (Internal Combustion) engine will continue to be the mainstream solution for freight and commercial vehicles, Denner mentioned that Bosch will play a key role in India’s electrification initiatives, and to transform urban mobility. “Keeping in mind the country’s climate change targets, we view the co-existence of fossil fuel engines and electrification with hybridisation as an interim solution,” he opined. Confident that hybrid technology will be a vital contributor to India’s goal of electrification taking into account the unique stopstart driving patterns and road congestion, Bosch, according to Denner, will support fleet operators and smaller vehicles alike as they shift to electric vehicles post the availability of feasible options. “We believe that the use of synthetic fuels as a scheduled supplement to electrification will play a vital role to reduce CO2 emission,” he said.
Connectivity
Apart from BSVI and electromobility, Bosch in India is also witnessing an uptake in vehicle connectivity as much as it is in the other markets around the world. The uptake in vehicle connectivity may not have yet got to the ground level, it is getting Indian engineers to play a vital role in its development. Revealed Denner, “I am pleased to say that India is playing a very special role for Bosch. Our Indian engineers are currently developing a global telematics platform enabled by our local engineering and manufacturing set-up. This platform will offer end-to-end solutions, including a connectivity control unit. The platform will also involve the integration of mobile network operators, development and
operation of cloud-based services, smartphone app development and support for back-end solutions.” The newly established Connected Mobility Solutions division of Bosch is helping it to serve the growing demand for mobility services in India.
Industry 4.0
Bosch is shaping the connected future not only in the mobility domain but also in developing solutions for Internet of Things (IoT). These solutions carry a brief that they should address the local needs the best. Mentioned Denner, “With solutions for the factories and cities of future, Bosch is supporting the Indian Government’s ‘Make in India’ and ‘Smart Cities’ initiatives. Smart manufacturing, or what we call Industry 4.0 is also a key element of the ‘Make in India’ initiative.” If the solutions, as part of Bosch’s industrial technology, are making factories increasingly automated, connected, and agile to be able to meet customer demands and expectations, Bosch is taking much pride in the expertise in relevant areas to offer a wide range of products and solutions for Industry 4.0.
Partnering with CII and the Confederation of Indian Industry’s Industry 4.0 Council to create ‘Smart Advanced Manufacturing and Rapid Transformation Hub’ national action plan, which involves government support for small and medium enterprises as well as industrial bodies with smart manufacturing policies, Bosch will be demonstrating Industry 4.0 solutions that it has employed at its own plants. Said Denner, “For our part, we will be demonstrating working Industry 4.0 solutions at our own plants.” With the Bosch Industry 4.0 Academy offering top-down training to senior executives, Bosch is looking at playing a key role in the Industry 4.0 revolution as it shapes up in India. The Academy has already trained more than 250 people. The Academy, which forms an integral part of the Bosch Production System philosophy, according to Denner, is open to external participants as well. The Bosch Production System philosophy is based on the concept of ‘lean manufacturing’.
Bosch Center for Artificial Intelligence (AI)
Another technology that will play a crucial role in all areas of connectivity – from connected mobility to buildings, factories, and cities – is Artificial Intelligence (AI). It is a key area of focus for Bosch among others. So much so, that Bosch is confident of AI being a key component of its products in the future. All the products that Bosch will make in the
future will possess AI, or will be designed, developed and manufactured with the help of AI said Denner. He informed that the Group established the Bosch Center for Artificial intelligence (BCAI) across three continents last year. Attracting an investment of Euro 300 million, India, he averred, is playing an important role. One of the two BCAI centers are based at Bangalore. The two other centers are at Sunnyvale, California, and Renningen, Germany. A fourth location is currently planned for China according to Denner.
Bosch set up a Robert Bosch Center for Data Science and AI at IIT Madras with an annual funding of Rupees-four crore for the next five years. The center will set a precedent in the way big data is used to improve problem-solving capabilities in the industrial domain. The outcome of the collaboration is expected to benefit the society at large. “At Bosch, we apply AI to optimise processes in manufacturing, engineering, and supply chain management. We also apply AI to enable intelligent services.” From customer experience in retail environments to predictive maintenance of vehicles, Bosch is supplying the foundation for new value added services and solutions. It is also supplying the foundation for new value added services to sectors like machine tools, intelligent parking management, automated driving, air pollution monitoring, and disease risk prediction for crops.
Well positioned in the
IoT ecosystem with sensors, softwares and services, Bosch is leveraging its expertise in IoT. It is also levergaing the experience it continues to gather in IoT.
It is in fact creating unique value propositions in this domain. In 2017, the Bosch Group registered total sales of around Euro-two billion in the Indian market. This accounts for a growth of 15.4 per cent. Said Denner, “With such a promising future for the automotive market in India, we are confident of our continued growth here.”