That the Asia Pacific Region (APR) will play a crucial role in formulating the growth path was reiterated by Dominiek Plancke, CEO, BG Automotive, Philips Lighting, who said: “We are here at the end of 2013 to underline the importance of this region for our business. We want the global take-off of 100 years here at Automechanika.”
SAFE, STYLISH, ECO-FRIENDLY PRODUCTS
By 2025, Plancke expects the market scenario to transform rather dramatically and look very different with two out of three people living in urban areas. This would place new challenges on overall mobility, the deterrents being congestion, air pollution and traffic, while a growing middle class would strive for financial prosperity. With an ageing population and life expectancy of not less than 50 years, there will be a need for better vision supported by good lighting. Therefore, Philips’ future products will revolve around the triple mantras of safety, styling and eco-friendliness.
Philips has led in the development of halogen and xenon lamps as well as light emitting diodes (LED) and organic LED (OLED) technologies and its mission is to deliver meaningful innovations that will change people’s lives, maintained Plancke.
“As we enter our second century, we are expanding our product portfolio with exciting new solutions. China, a centre of global automotive production and the world’s largest automotive market, is certainly the most ideal place for us to showcase our latest products to the APAC market,” he said.
While the focus has predominantly been the OEM segment, since 2010, Philips Automotive Lighting has been stepping up efforts to woo the aftermarket to facilitate car owners to change the bulbs on their vehicles.
INDIA FOCUS
At Automechanika Shanghai 2013, Philips had displayed many new innovative lamps designed both for the OE and aftermarket in emerging markets. The focus for India will be LEDs and lamps for the growing two-wheeler and passenger cars market. Two months ago, the company launched its Weather Vision product in India for passenger cars and plans to extend it to motorcycles this year, especially for headlamps and fog lamps which will help enhance road safety, particularly during adverse climatic conditions.
Weather Vision is based on the premise that drivers are eight times more uncomfortable driving their cars during adverse conditions than in darkness as it increases the glare. To mitigate this anomaly, special lighting – preferably yellow light that can better penetrate fog, rain and snow – and increased visibility are the answer. Company officials maintain that the high-brightness filament of the Weather Vision lamp steps up visibility by 60 percent compared to a standard lamp, thereby ensuring safer road driving.
Other key products planned for rollout in India this year include Color Vision for headlamps and White Vision which is slated for a Q1 launch around February-March. Using Color Vision in Indian cars is legal and carmakers like Honda and Toyota are believed to be evincing interest in offering varied solutions of styling in their car models.
The Color Vision range of Philips’ H4 and H7 automotive lamps allows drivers to customise their car headlamps with the colour effect created by the reflection of light into the lamp’s reflector optics. When switched on, the headlamps are illuminated with a shade of blue, green, yellow or purple but the beam projected forward is pure white light. Like Weather Vision, Color Vision lights up the road with 60 percent more light compared to a standard lamp and increases visibility by an average 25 metres, making it easier for drivers to anticipate obstacles. So far, Color Vision has been launched in Europe. Plancke says the company wants to test consumer interest in Asia as well. The lamp will be launched sometime in the future, possibly end-2014 or early 2015.
STYLISH VISION
Philips says White Vision, thanks to a blue top coating, helps consumers to style their cars better and also deliver improved vision on the road since the blue absorption coating on the filament allows 20 percent more white light than a standard lamp. Philips' high- performance burner of a slim diameter with optimised gas mixture generates 40 percent more light on the road. The UV- blocking quartz glass in the bulb is resistant to vibration and thermal shock as well as humidity and extreme temperatures. Different upgrade (advanced) options like Blue Vision are now being considered for two-wheelers in India also. The UV block also prevents the plastic headlamp units from getting discoloured.
India with its huge two-wheeler market offers high growth potential. According to Ronald van Harten, marketing director, Automotive Aftermarket Asia Pacific, Philips Lighting, the company plans to expand its lighting solutions and reach to Indian consumers in the aftermarket. It aims to both look at how to increase distribution and reach and also how consumers buy products, ensuring it helps mechanics push Philips products in a better way. Later, it will explore options in the truck segment as well.
In India there are three main lamp makers –- Philips, Halonix and Osram. While local player Halonix is less focused on upgrades or advanced products, Osram and Philips compete to offer customers more upgradable options. Buyers of high-end cars also want to spend money on upgrade products.
“In the Indian aftermarket, customers are demanding more stylish and safe cars and stylish and safe lights," added Harten. "Overall, the Indian middle class and young people want their cars in a trendy way.”
Dimitri Jallade, head of marketing and strategy and VP, BG Automotive, Philips Lighting, was of the view that global trends specific to Asia indicate that the notion of mobility and car ownership is changing and mobility solutions are now centered around an individual instead of the group and are becoming more customised and personalised.
“Our intention is not to compete in the lower segment of the market; we are not built for that. We believe that by looking at customers, we can bring extra added value to our bulbs to address the higher segment of the market.” Citing an example, he said that some years ago in the two-wheeler range only one product had an extra feature – vibration resistance – which was incorporated across the range to sustain road conditions in emerging markets though at a higher price. “So the way forward is to find the relevant elements for markets such as India,” he said.
In India, LEDs still remain in a nascent stage and are mostly limited to rear lighting. Globally though, LEDs have evolved considerably over the past decade or so – the earliest adoption of LEDs in front lamps was five years ago and at the rear 10 years ago, for high-end cars. “The next 5-10 years will see the penetration of LEDs in countries like India, especially in the rear lamp. LEDs in the front lamps will come later,” added Plancke.
LED-ING THE WAY
Philips is looking at rolling out LEDs in blinkers for the two-wheeler segment in 2014 in India, both for the OE and aftermarket. Blinkers or signalling lights in two-wheelers offer an interesting proposition and Philips is eyeing innovative solutions to eliminate costs for developing complete solutions for a blinker.
This correspondent was taken on a visit of the Philips Automotive Lighting facility IPSC Malu, the second for lighting in China, which specialises in high-performance halogen bulbs with imported components. The production lines have been imported from Europe, leveraging advanced technologies. The IPSC Malu plant uses advanced technologies for single-filament quartz-glass headlighting bulbs, six-axis alignment system, vision systems and laser and TIG welding operations.
Norbert Lakatos, operations manager, Philips Automotive Lighting IPSC Malu, who took the group of journalists around the facility, said it currently employs 130 staffers and is one of the highest automated plants.
The facility is a long-term commitment of Philips to the Asia Pacific markets. Of its key customers, an overwhelming 99 percent are OEMs with 70 percent production targeted at the local Chinese market and 30 percent for export to other Asia Pacific countries. The plant produces all parts in-house and has a 7 in 10-million bulb failure rate.
We also undertook a tour of the Philips Application Development Centre APR, one of two such global centres with the other one at Aachen, Germany. The application and design team comprises 23 engineers with nine based at the Shanghai Centre. Established in March 2008, the Shanghai Application Centre provides high quality and fast-responding design support for Philip Automotive’s key customers in APR.
The Centre specialises in optical and driver design, thermal simulation and prototyping as well as organising innovation workshops and specialised technical training for internal and corporate clients.
Philips Automotive Lighting's China plant will, for sure, play an important role in servicing the needs of emerging markets like India. However, while Philips does not plan to set up an assembly site in India anytime soon, it cannot afford to not consolidate its position and further penetrate the growing market in India. Therefore, the company's future India roadmap will witness a huge expansion in the distribution network with a number of new products to roll out in the four-wheeler space while two-wheelers will become a key enabler to garner a higher market share.