The Tata Group’s thrust on innovation and research & development (R&D) has resulted in a 15-fold increase in the number of innovations by group companies over the last decade.
Tata Innovista, a 10-year old group-wide programme is held annually to encourage innovations across the $103 billion conglomerate. In 2006, Tata Group started the practice of capturing and celebrating innovations of Tata companies through Tata Innovista, which presents awards across six categories.
Tata Innovista 2015 received 1,580 projects under the Promising Innovations category compared to 101 in 2006, representing a 15-fold increase. “Of these, the top 60 innovations are expected to deliver an estimated financial benefit of $ 1.1 billion annually of which around $980 million is in terms of revenue growth and around $290 million in terms of cost saving,” Mukund Rajan, Member – Group Executive Council and Brand Custodian, Tata Sons, told a media conference.
Gopichand Katragadda, the first chief technology officer at Tata Sons appointed last year, said the Tata Group saw a dramatic rise in the number of patents registered and it stands at around 2,000. “We expect this number to double in the next three years,” he said.
Mr. Katragadda said that technology differentiated innovation would position the group for future growth. “In its technology journey, the group has presently identified four focus areas — Sustainable Energy, Food & Wellness, Consumer Electronics and Factory & Fleet Digitisation.”
The Tata Group has formed four clusters on which it will focus including Defence & Aerospace, Retail, Infrastructure & realty and Finance, Mr. Rajan said. “Additionally, we have embraced group-wide initiatives in aspects such as customer centricity, diversity and internationalisation and we expect to see increasing innovation in these areas.”
While FY15 figures are awaited, in 2013-14, the Tatas spent around Rs.16,000 crore or $2.6 billion on R&D. The level Research & Development (R&D) spend by Indian companies was around 0.9 per cent while for the Tata Group, it was above 2.5 per cent Mr. Rajan said adding, “We certainly want to take this level up.”
