World’s leading auto parts maker Bosch Ltd is leading several initiatives such as automated cars, implementation of Industry 4.0 and on newer technologies to make driving safer. In an interview with BusinessLine, Jan-Oliver Roehrl, CTO and Director, Bosch Ltd, and Soumitra Bhattacharya, Managing Director, Bosch Ltd and President Bosch Group in India, share the company’s plans for these projects. Excerpts.

Bosch had said it will hire about 10,000 more employees. Where do you plan to deploy them?

The hiring that we talked some time back was for Bosch India. We have a big software company and we primarily do a lot of hiring there. Bosch Ltd has a total associate strength of 9,700. It’s the quality of hiring nowadays in India that matters not the numbers. As far as capex is concerned, we had a capex of ₹460 crore and for the next two years, the capex will be between ₹450 crore and ₹650 crore. So, we will continue investing in the facilities in Adugodi, Bidadi and Nashik. We will continue to invest but our primary investments will continue in Adugodi and the new plant in Bidadi.

Let us look at some of the initiatives such as accident prevention systems. By when will it come to India?

The anti-lock braking system (ABS) part, a safety regulation which the government of India has implemented, is getting implemented with effect from 2018-2019 for two-wheelers. This will come out of Robert Bosch Chassis, which is a fully-owned Bosch company and is located in Pune. All our 13 legal entities work closely. We have a common interface with all our customers for Bosch group in India. We don’t segregate for all our OEMs or all other customers.

What I think India needs besides ABS, is ESP (Electronic Stability Program). It has now become standard across the world, and I believe, India would also mandate this. And it’s not for Bosch business, but I think it is important to save lives.

But these things take time to adopt, especially in India...

You see, there are two ways of implementing any such process. One is to do it willingly. Usually, the industry does this for the high-end cars. It is for the compact cars where the government will need to put a legislation based on the facts and figures, which if I share with you, currently the entire emerged world or developed world has implemented ESP as a standard.

So, it is just a matter of time before the Indian government implements it just the way we have leaped frogged from BS IV to BS VI.

After BS VI, we will have delta on emission of only six years. So, same way, I feel for safety factors also, we have a delta between us and the emerged world or the developed world and we will reduce it and the only way to reduce it is through leapfrogging.

What is the update on Bosch’s Agile Project House?

We believe strongly that all good companies need to prepare and not only do well in the core business, example, ICE-Internal Combustion Engine, it's going to stay in India and the world for a long time.

Then of course, you have a mix of what is going to be in diesel and gasoline. We also believe that other forms of mobility like hybridisation-PHEV, hybrid electric vehicles or PEV, will come in, but when will it come cannot be anticipated because the barrier primarily happens to be from the cost front and back front along with charging ecosystem.

Bosch India has decided that since our parent has knowledge in hybridisation and pure electrification vehicles, we have created this agile house pulling in talented young workforce from multi-division,multi-location and multi-legal entities of Bosch. We have extended this to electromobility and are looking at how it can be regionalised, what solutions can we give to show that Bosch India can have a Bosch-powered electric vehicle.

This Project House will be a very interesting concept which will give opportunities and solutions for the customers.

One of the interesting things are the self-driving cars that's coming. We have a lot of smart city projects that are coming up. Do you think they would be the initial adopters considering that you can start from scratch? What's your sense on that.

Many of these things first start in big campuses. What are smart campuses?

They are actually mini cities. Smart campuses have a strong-controlled environment. For any such thing, you need to have a controlled-environment. For example, The German Autobahn is also a controlled-environment. They are far more controlled as compared to the Indian highways.

We have shown that a car without a driver through an app can park itself in a normal working environment where children and others are walking around.

We have showcased by collaborating with Daimler. Bosch India has shown that we have the ability to deliver a park assist which can help you to park automatically. We have international solutions that are even more advanced and I strongly believe that they will come to India.

While we are on this subject of automated cars, you are one of the early adopters of industry 4.0. What is the status there?

Bosch India is one of the shining examples of implementing 4.0 where you can see used cases which are seamless on source-make deliver but we have also shown government of India that we have used cases of menu cards where industry 4.0 can be used in MSME in India.

We have affordable selective industry 4.0 use cases which you can selectively take out and use or you can take the whole seamless solution.

We are one of the few companies who are not only selling to third party but first implementing industry 4.0 in our 18 factories across India.

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