Johnson Controls Pricol develops instrument cluster for Renault Duster

Johnson Controls Pricol Pvt Ltd, a brand-new new 50:50 joint venture between the $20-billion-plus Automotive Experience business of diversified technology company Johnson Controls and Pricol Ltd, delivered the first off-tool samples of an instrument cluster for Renault’s Duster SUV from its plant in Pirangut near Pune last fortnight.

The order was won, against stiff competition from Continental and Magneti Marelli, even before the joint venture was formalised, mainly because of each of the partners’ individual relationships with the French carmaker — Johnson Controls (JCI) as a supplier back in Europe, and Pricol as the supplier for the Mahindra Renault Logan.

The all-electronic cluster is a Johnson Controls global design, but the tooling and the manufacturing line was designed entirely locally by Pricol, according to Vijay Mohan, chairman of India’s leading supplier of instrument clusters for wheeled vehicles of all kinds. Supplies will start next month, Mohan told Autocar Professional.

JCI’s interiors business already operates in India through a joint venture with Tata Autocomp Systems for seating; the establishment of Johnson Controls Pricol last fortnight marked the entry of its electronics business, and thus a full-fledged automotive presence in the country. It also highlighted the company’s penchant for partnerships.

Jeff DeBest, the man responsible for JCI’s global activities in automotive electronics, sees the “ability to partner with people and to work within joint ventures” as one of his company’s strengths. “It’s a model we use in other countries around the world, and it’s proved to be very effective,” he said. In China, where the company operates 49 facilities through 28 joint ventures, it has a “very significant” market share and “big growth”.

But DeBest is unabashedly bullish about the prospects for his business – “one of the focuses of JCI” – in India. “The new venture allows us to bring our global expertise around human-machine interfaces and -interaction to India, with a partner that has local operating knowledge and a 25-year history of execution in the industry,” he enthused. “It will make us a very strong competitor in this market.”

Pricol brought in an existing factory at Pirangut (Plant 5) that manufactured electromechanical instrument clusters and accounted for “Rs 110–115 crore” of its total turnover of Rs 930 crore in 2011–12; JCI’s contribution, besides an undisclosed cash component, will be its “full portfolio” of interior electronics technologies — for instrument clusters and displays, body controllers, passive entry systems, and immobilisers.

ELIOT LOBO