|
Global auto-makers are picking up talent from their Indian research and development centres for deputation to their headquarters. Be it Paris or Tokyo, the headquarters of companies such as Renault, Nissan, Honda and Suzuki are using the skills of their Indian staff to work on some of their global models.
Maruti Suzuki is on its verge to raise the number of engineers who will be stationed in Suzuki Motor Corporation’s headquarters in Japan. In the current financial year, the company is planning to send 80 engineers to Japan and last year the number stood between 25 and 30.
Mr C. V. Raman, Chief General Manger, Research & Development at Maruti said,“We are increasing the number of engineers who are being sent to Japan for six months to two years. While some of them are being trained on India-specific models, many also work on global models of Suzuki,”.
Hyundai Motor India also sends its Indian engineers to its overseas development centres.
According to the Managing Director and CEO, Hyundai Motor India Ltd, H. S. Lheem,“Our Hyderabad R&D centre employs a staff of 220. We send our technical staff to our centres in Korea, Frankfurt and Detroit to work on our world-wide models. We usually send 20-30 engineers depending on the project,”
Renault, which has set up a design centre in Mumbai, too said that it posted its staff up to a year in Paris.
A spokesperson for Renault India told,“Our design centre is one of the six satellite centres globally. The Indian centre has the capability to design from a rough sketch to a 3D design and to the actual production of the car. But for cross-pollination of ideas, we do depute some of our engineers from six months to a year,”
Honda Siel Cars India, which has so far been assigning temporary overseas posting to its technical staff mainly for country specific models, is also planning to follow the trend. One of its company officials said, “Till now our technical staff used to spend two to three years on models that are to be launched in the country. But now with a compact car, which we will be launching with India as the lead market, inputs will be taken from our Indian staff in designing and development.” The Hindu Business Line
May 26, 2009
|
