German auto supplier Bosch is planning to invest Rs.650 crore (over 100 million euros) this year to expand its presence in India and hire talent.
The company made the announcement after Prime Minister Narendra Modi and German Chancellor Angela Merkel visited the Bosch facilities in Bengaluru.
Bosch said that the Indian engineers had made a significant contribution to the company’s success story in India as well as worldwide activities in strategic areas such as data mining and smart manufacturing.
“India is a key location in our global innovation network,” said Peter Tyroller, the member of the Bosch board of management responsible for Asia Pacific. “Our commitment to developing talent and the competence of our local engineers are part of our success story in India.”
Three new plantsThe company said that the smart manufacturing would be an integral part of all 14 Bosch plants in India by 2018. Bosch is also setting up three new plants in Bidadi, Karnataka and Chennai and Gangaikondan in Tamil Nadu. Overall the company made capital investments of about Rs.500 crore in 2014.
Bosch, which has the largest development centre outside Germany located in Bengaluru and Coimbatore, has over 12,000 research and development associates. The company said that it was developing a broad range of innovations. One such product is a compact retina camera, which uses a special software to detect medical conditions like cataract at an early stage. It has also developed an innovation that can be used by emergency service providers to prioritise the type of ambulance service needed to reach an accident location. The technology mines hidden insights from huge chunks of automobile accident data collected by various government agencies. This estimates the probability of injury severity based on real-time vehicle, accident and environment information. “We develop innovative solutions in India which are used in products around the world,” said Steffen Berns, President of the Bosch Group in India.
