Indian Automotive Industry: A Review & Its Classification

History of Automobiles:

Numerous innovation in the fields of engineering comprising engines, fuels, tires safety, societal infrastructure, manufacturing standards and sales & marketing etc impacted the growth of the automobile industry. 

Some researchers quote the first vehicles as “sail mounted carriages” derived by something else than animals or humans in the seventeen century. On the flip side, other believed initiation of automobile industry since the innovation of engine. The year 1876 witnessed a breakthrough technology “Four stroke internal combustion gasoline-fueled engine” innovated in Europe and America while invention in the areas of steering wheel, floor mounted accelerator and rubber tire in 19 century triggered the automotive industry because of ease of use. The man behind introduction of assembly line was Henry Ford which caused mass production to achieve economies in vehicle production. At the time of World War II, automobile manufacturers and weapons by pausing production of passenger vehicles. In post-World War II particularly during 1950s and 1960s, a wide variety of technological inventions like fiber glass bodies, good quality fuel with better compression ratio attract customer due to more comfortable vehicle and better look. 

Automobile industry is one of the largest production/assembly activity across the globe. The automotive demand has shown wide variation from very high demand to slow down in India and world as well. In the last three decades, numerous international automotive manufacturer moved in the country for manufacturing and sales of their vehicles in local market and as well as export to international customers. To deal with the global competition, the big name of the industries established their assembly plant in various parts of India which played a vital role in country economy and created new jobs in the bulk. Our economy is very much reliant upon the performance, sustainability and profitability of this important sector.  The current turnover of the automotive industry is around USD 26.2 billon. This huge global competitiveness is exerting immense pressure on the industries manufacturing management especially on Supply Chain Management to deal with cost stress although it is presumed globalization cause cost effectiveness, however there are lot many challenges such as logistic cost. 

INDIAN AUTOMOBILE INDUSTRY 

It was about 1897, first car ran in India while until 1930s, only few cars were directly imported. Indian automobile industry started raising since 1940s and Mahindra & Mahindra company was started by two brothers to trade under license from Willys. In a short time, the company established its branch to manufacture of light commercial vehicles (LCVs) and agricultural vehicles (tractors). However, Cars were carrying the tag of luxury till Japanese car manufacturers entered in the Indian market with the establishment of Maruti Udyog in the 1980s a joint ventures for manufacturing motorcycles and light commercial-vehicles, followed by numerous automobile manufacturers where Tata Motors, Mahindra & Mahindra and Hindustan Motors are few, to mention. Society of Indian Automobile Manufactures (SIAM) estimates that annual vehicle sales will be nearly 9 million by 2020 and India may witness the highest car volumes with approximately 611 million vehicles on the roads. 

Indian Automobile Industry Classification 

Indian automotive industry is producing a wide variety of vehicles e.g. Two and Three wheelers, passenger vehicles, light, medium and heavy commercial vehicles, agricultural vehicles (tractors and combines), construction machineries/vehicles and ancillary (component segment for all these categories). According to Society of Indian Automobile Manufactures (SIAM) and Automotive Component Manufacturers Association of India (ACMA), a modified classification of Indian automotive industry has been proposed in following.

Classification of Indian Automotive Industry

AUTHOR:

AMIT GUPTA

Dean (Research) & Professor, MED, Geeta Engineering College