Be it automobile manufacturing, electricity production or water management – hardly any of today’s industries can do without electronics and electrical connectivity. Industrial connectivity needs connections and that’s precisely what Weidmüller stands for. Manoj Dunung, Managing Director India of Weidmueller Group, explains potential of Indian market and the importance of connectivity as the world moves towards Industry 4.0.

 

Germany is one of India's most important trade partners. What are your views on India as a market?

 

India has a fast growing domestic market and offers high and long term economic growth. Investments in infrastructure, process, energy & transportation are increasing. At the same time, global companies are setting up operations and/or engineering R&D facilities in India. The presence of foreign companies in India will gradually raise quality standards of products and services.

 

How do you see the potential of automation solutions in India? Which end-user industries are the main demand drivers for your products & solutions in India?

 

Weidmueller has expanded its presence in India and has opened an office in Bengaluru with approximately 3000 sq ft floor area in lieu of its future requirement of space and manpower. Presently, operating with a team of 27 people, which we plan to double in the next 2-3 years, the office is well equipped to provide support for sales, marketing, training and related services to the Indian market. 

 

Future expansion will be on sales and distribution networks at strategic locations. We have opened a new ware house facility in Bangalore with area of 4000 sq ft. Our ware house there has become fully functional since November 2017. Next will be value-added solutions with local assembly and local manufacturing in line with the ‘Make in India’ motto.

 

The automation industry is driven currently by the automotive, energy (which includes power generation, transmission & distribution, renewable energy such as solar and wind) and process industries, including chemicals and fertilisers. The other sectors that also use automation to lower variance are the pharmaceutical, food & beverages, water and wastewater, cement, textile, metals, and the mining industry.

 

How has been the performance of your company in India since it was established in India?

 

Industrial connectivity needs connections. That’s what Weidmueller stands for: performance, competence and reliability. With 4,800 employees, our company supports customers and partners with products, solutions and services in the industrial environment of power, signal and data. We have seen a consistent growth over the years since inception and further investments are planned in coming years based on the performance so far to address the growing customer expectations. Consultative selling with problem solving approach, prompt service & support to achieve customer satisfaction has been our key measures.

 

What is driving the demand for your products in India?

 

Indian industries have realised the importance of robotics and automation, and are willing to make substantial investments as the cost of skilled labour is rising and production processes are gathering speed without compromising on quality standards. These factors are forcing the Indian manufacturers to consider industrial robots as a viable option, despite the relatively high-capital costs.

 

Information and communication technologies are the main driving force behind developments. The company's development objective is to link these technologies sensibly with customers' components and applications, in order to create solutions. Our long-term goal is to design an automation structure which with extremely versatile production facilities responds quickly to 

customer requirements.

 

What are the key challenges and opportunities for your company in India?

 

The lack of skilled workforce is one of the major challenges faced in the country by most of the industries. The workforce is usually under-utilised as they are assigned lower-level jobs, which restrict the growth of the employee and employer. Apart from the practical day-to-day challenges due to our complex regulatory procedures, like any other growing industry, we face a challenge to 

meet the low price expected from the market.

 

Industrial connectivity has significant overlap with our traditional business but we will not be successful if we focus on the hardware components alone – we need to be seen by our customers as the competent partner who helps to efficiently design cabinets and field architectures. Thus, our claim ‘more than components’.

 

Industrial communication addresses the key trend in factory automation – those players who are able to provide safe and efficient communication means from the sensor to the cloud will be considered valuable partners by the Industry 4.0 or Smart Factory ecosystems.

 

Besides our efforts regarding automation products and solutions, we have to use our ability in digitalization – ie communication features and competence, condition monitoring and analytics to differentiate from those who merely focus on automation. In summary our claim is ‘solutions beyond automation’.

 

What are the emerging trends in your industry?

 

Information and communication technologies are the main driving force behind developments as part of the trend towards Industry 4.0. Weidmüller's development objective is to link these technologies sensibly with customers' components and applications, in order to create solutions.

 

Industry 4.0 is still in its infancy, with various companies and research institutions working on a range of concepts and pursuing different ambitions. The longer-term goal is to design an automation structure which – with extremely versatile production facilities – responds quickly, simply and competitively to customer requirements. To this end, all components are linked via a network in which they communicate with each other – this applies especially to all the electronic components involved in the automation process. 

 

Whether a production facility will in future be manufacturing parts in small-scale series, even down to a batch size of 1, according to a customer's specific requirements is unclear at present. The basic concept of Industry 4.0, however, paves the way for compelling solutions: the classic automation pyramid is replaced by a network made up of numerous intelligent components which interact and communicate with each other within this network. 

 

While modern-day production facilities manufacture as many identical parts as possible and as efficiently as possible, individual customer needs are set to increasingly take centre stage. As part of automotive production, each car is now being tailor-made as it were – in accordance with disparate customer requirements. This set-up will also be feasible in future for many other goods.

 

The requirements placed on production system flexibility are increasing exponentially, giving rise to the need for more versatile configurations. In future, control will no longer be top-down, but the ‘raw materials’ will already receive information about which different production steps they will undergo, until a customised product is ready for delivery at the end. 

 

What are your growth plans in India? 

 

Weidmuller has earned reputation of being a supplier of high quality products. We have been witnessing steady growth over past few years. To cater the growing demand of Weidmuller products we are focusing on industry segment approach with application engineering and solutions to solve the customer problem areas. Thus, the outlook for 2018 seems positive. The order numbers are encouraging so far & we look forward to an exponential growth.

 

Any message you would like to give to the industry… 

 

It is difficult to hire a skilled worker from the market, because most of the educational institutes are not having sufficient infrastructure and knowledge-pool to develop the skills required for today’s modern & technologically fast-growing era. The focus was always on conventional & traditional education. Corporates have no choice but to upgrade the skills of their work force though external consultant. 

 

While Government of India is putting lot of efforts in this direction, it is still a long way to go & lot to be done to enhance the skill of the workers to make them ready for Industry 4.0 and high-end automation. 

 

India needs to upgrade standard of education; industries should have active participation in deciding curriculum for educational institutes and colleges should be near to industrial hubs so that students will possess required skills for the industry after passing out. The syllabus should be a blend of theory and practical skills to survive in competitive industrial scenario.