Dopo l’industria del software e il tessile, decolla in
India il settore auto.
- Fino a pochi anni fa grandi gruppi rifuggivano da
produttori indiani per la cattiva qualità, protetta da barriere doganali. Con
la crescente liberalizzazione ora la parola d’ordine è la qualità. - A Chennai (Madras, india meridionale) si è
formato grande polo auto, con accumulo di certificati internazionali di
qualità, e si riproducono le tecniche jap di gestione. Gruppo TVS,
maggior gruppo componentistica indiano, ora esporta un terzo della produzione;
sua filiale ha ottenuto 5 volte il premio GM di “fornitore dell’anno” e
fornisce TUTTI i tappi per radiatori montati da GM. Gruppo Rane esporta
il 28% dopo aver ridotto la difettosità da 10.000 a 250 pezzi per milione… - Ford e Hyundai hanno aperto fabbriche a Chennai,
BMW lo farà, VW è interessata. Saint Gobain ha aperto
fabbrica che potrà facilmente espandere la produzione da 500mila a 3 milioni
parabrezza/anno. - Due altri poli auto stanno crescendo attorno a Delhi
e Bombay; ma processi analoghi sono in corso in Messico, Thailandia,
Cina - McKinsey prevede che l’outsourcing di componenti
auto salirà dai $65 MD del 2002 a $375 MD nel 2015, di cui India otterrà $25 MD
(ora $1MD). - “Se pensate che Detroit stia male adesso, aspettate di
vedere cosa è in arrivo”.
By SEBASTIAN MALLABY
The Washington Post
December 6, 2005
CHENNAI, India — The next wave of
globalization is swelling here, in this southern Indian city that was battered
by a real wave during last year’s tsunami. This new wave is not about Gap
T-shirts or Dell laptops, the poster children for the light industries that
already have global supply chains. And it is not about software and/or call
centers, the industries for which India is famous. This new globalization is
about heavier manufacturing, particularly cars. Detroit’s panicking firms know
it.
Cars? They are not what spring to mind when
you say "Indian economic miracle." India’s economy has grown at
more than 6% per year since market reforms began in 1991. But it has scrambled
the classic transition from agriculture to manufacturing and then eventually to
services. Indian agriculture has indeed shrunk from 30% of output to 22% since
the reforms began. But manufacturing has not increased its share.
Until the reforms of the 1990s, India had
good engineers but lousy manufacturing because high tariff walls made its firms
complacent. But the opening of India’s economy has forced its manufacturers to
reinvent themselves. Chennai’s auto-components firms have done this almost
manically.
Ten years ago, their brakes and valves
were crummy enough to scare away the international car majors that considered
manufacturing in India. Today, you can’t spend an
hour with any of the components firms without hearing about the
international quality certifications they’ve amassed; the Deming Prize,
awarded for manufacturing excellence by a Japanese committee, has acquired
talismanic status. The city’s business leaders pepper their conversation
with Japanese management lingo. The results are dramatic. The TVS Group,
the largest of India’s auto-components firms, now exports around a third of
its output — proof that it meets international standards. The rival Rane
Group reports that it has reduced defects from 10,000 parts per million
to 250 and that 28% of its engine valves are now exported. One of the TVS
companies, Sundram Fasteners, has won a General Motors "Supplier
of the Year" award five times, and it supplies 100% of GM’s radiator caps.
Because Indian car parts are now reliable,
international car majors have reversed their attitude. Ford and Hyundai
have opened factories in Chennai; BMW recently announced that it would
follow; Volkswagen and GM seem interested. Multinational parts makers
are arriving, too, strengthening Chennai’s attraction as a hub. Saint-Gobain,
a French glassmaker, has built a brand new production line that may
foretell Chennai’s future. It’s designed so that the initial capacity of
500,000 windshields per year can be cheaply scaled up to 3 million. In
short, Chennai’s car industry is reaching critical mass, and its output is good
enough to compensate for dodgy (though improving) infrastructure.
The same story is playing itself out in
India’s two other automotive hubs, around Delhi and Mumbai,
and to an even larger extent in Mexico, Thailand and (yes) China. The McKinsey
consultancy projects that the outsourcing of car parts, relatively limited
until now, will sextuple from $65 billion in 2002 to $375 billion in 2015, with
India’s share soaring from around $1 billion to $25 billion. If you think
Detroit is ailing now, wait until you see what’s coming.