Panasonic looks at Indian auto sector to drive its Toughbook brand

Panasonic, the multinational electronics corporation, is looking actively at the automotive industry to drive its Toughbook brand of laptops.  On July 11, in Pune, in association with Autocar Professional, it held the first edition of an industry focussed session called ‘Drive Ahead – Preparing for Tough Bends’ in Pune. The three-hour session was attended by select industry officials, which included decision makers from Tata Motors, Voith Industrial Services and DSK Hyosung, among others.

The session included presentations from Yoshihiro Nakanishi, general manager – Toughbook (systems solution division), Panasonic India; Gunjan Sachdev, general manager & national business head (systems solution division), Panasonic India; industry case studies by Abhijit Kallianpur, senior GM, automotive service solutions and automotive aftermarket, Bosch; and Jayanta Nath, head – quality BRM, corporate IT, Tata Motors. Hetal Sonpal, head, strategic alliances, Intel India, was another speaker at the conference.

Nakanishi spoke about the innovative technologies in Panasonic’s Toughbook and Toughpad range which are designed and developed on the company’s seven key technologies – high visibility (bright sun light), thermal management, wireless, lightweight, long battery life, ruggedness and security. Providing a live demonstration by dropping the Toughbook from a height, he underlined the applications of magnesium cabinet and damping sheet (termed as super sheet by Panasonic officials), which primarily reduce the impact of shock.

“Panasonic Toughbook and Toughpad give access to applications and data in the most challenging mobile environments resulting in solutions that transform people’s working lives and lives operational efficiency,” said Sachdev as he highlighted their utilities in the automotive industry across production, testing and quality applications. According to the official, the Panasonic Toughbook devices are used by all the major brands including Jaguar Land Rover, Ford, Volkswagen, Renault, General Motors, Toyota, Suzuki, Volvo, Honda, BMW, Daimler, and Mahindra & Mahindra. “More than 100,000 units of these Toughbooks are deployed in the automotive space globally since 2006,” he added.

In India, the OEMs using these devices including Suzuki, Tata Motors, Mahindra & Mahindra, Harley-Davidson India, Hyundai Motor India, Bajaj Auto and JCB India.

The second conference in the series takes place tomorrow in New Delhi, July 17, at the Holiday Inn from 10:00 am to 2:30 pm. To register, https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1DyKBtbl2Ik-imjDgA5_gLW-5r-0XnsVpXUbD3ADYCgY/viewform