ELCINA kicks off study

Rajoo Goel, secretary general, Elcina, said the study will attempt to cover more than 80 percent of the electronic manufacturers across the country. The auto industry has seen significant growth, however, the growth in automotive electronics, in some segments, has been lower than expectations.

Though the imports of electronics pertaining to the automotive industry attracts a 10 percent customs duty, it is still not encouraging local manufacturing. For instance, in-car infotainment systems and security related systems that account for majority of the electronic content in the car, are imported. Only a few components and modules including instrument clusters, printed circuit boards and wiring harness are being manufactured locally, Goel added.

According to Goel, the average bill of material of electronics in a car is around 30 percent in the developed nations as compared to six percent in India. “This will go up but I cannot say when it will reach 30 percent of total bill of material,” he said. “We hope to complete the study by January 2011 and will publish it shortly after,” he said.

The comprehensive study will help the industry and the government by giving clear directions to move forward. It will also help understand the specific requirements of the various verticals as production data of manufacturers in different fields of electronics will be covered. Besides, it will help the industry to attract more investments and enable the government to formalise a policy. For the auto industry, it will augment its operations better though it is already an organised sector.

Elcina will be organising ‘Source India’ programme – a sourcing meet, in December 2010. Last year, IT, telecom and consumer electronics segments participated in the programme. Elcina will invite SIAM and ACMA for this event, he said. The impetus to include auto industry is the increasing opportunity for Tier-1 and Tier-2 companies, he added.