Continental bags Hyundai India’s digital instrument cluster order, ramps up capacity

Continental Automotive India has announced that the company has bagged orders to supply digital instrument clusters to Hyundai Motor India for its Venue crossover and Verna sedan. As a result, it has enhanced its production and development capabilities at its manufacturing plant in Bangalore, Karnataka, in order to meet the growing local demand.

Part of its business area vehicle networking and information (VNI), the business unit Human Machine Interface or HMI, says the company, is focused on developing systems and solutions for a holistic human-machine interface, such as instrument clusters, display solutions, head-up displays, multimedia systems and cockpit high-performance computers.

With Continental Automotive India gaining new customer (OEM) contracts to supply for both local as well as export models from the country, it has surpassed the eight-million-units production milestone for instrument clusters since inception, and saw the number touching a milestone one million mark two years ago in 2018 itself.

Now, as it sees the global demand for digital instrument clusters on the upswing, Continental India is also leveraging India’s software talent to ramp up its HMI R&D capabilities in the country to enrich the user experience of its digital clusters.

Digital speedometer, tachometer and a host of other multi -nformation functionalities are integrated into the LCD display cluster.

Intensifying local R&D
According to Prasad C Basappa, Head of Business Unit - Human Machine Interface, Continental Automotive India, " We are upbeat about the growth potential of products, software and services that enrich the user experience (UX) of vehicle drivers and passengers in India. The user experience is becoming the key product differentiator for vehicle manufacturers and buying decisions by consumers are influenced by UX more than ever. The global market is growing significantly, and the value share is also increasing in India. As a global market leader in this field, we have received some significant orders in 2020 to continue our growth journey here.”

“For this reason, the recent capacity augmentation in Bangalore for HMI supports Continental's philosophy of ‘In the market, for the market’. In addition to supporting the local market, our products manufactured in India continue to be used on cars that some vehicle manufacturers export to different markets in Asia, North America, Europe and Africa”, Basappaadded.

The engineering department of HMI BU was established in 2018 in India, with a vision to set up an agile autonomous central software development centre to support global and local businesses. Since then, there has been expansive growth both in terms of workforce and software capabilities, developing technologies such as the highly sophisticated cockpit high-performance computers for global automakers. The company is also on the lookout for appropriate opportunities to utilize this competence for the Indian market, by partnering with local OEMs which are looking to increase the interior electronic content.

The company is also gravitating towards Industry 4.0 tools to enhance production and sort of fast track its manufacturing units into smart factories by deploying technologies such as AR, AI, cobots and automated optical inspection as well as automated guided vehicles. According to PhanindraKarody, plant manager,Bangalore Plant, Continental Automotive India, "With increased capacity and growing production volume, our customers will greatly benefit from our smart Industry 4.0 factory set-up which guarantees precision, efficiency optimisation, accountability, traceability, and overall quality."