Design EngineerIng services cover a whole gamut of services made possible through
-Computer Aided Design, Computer Aided Manufacturing. and Computer Aided Engineering (CAD/CAM/CAE). This industry has emerged as one of the fastest growing as confirmed by a host of inhouse and Industry studies, most notably the NASSCOM Booz Allen Hamilton study which estimates that" as much as 25 to 30 percent of the world's offshored engineering services". to the tune of $50 Billion, could come India's way. Of this. design engineering services could be one of the major contributor of revenues.
     So, to begin with. where do we stand on the global design engineering services platform. "I think we are still some distance from claiming the tide of design engineerIng capital, but there are good signs all around that we are going in that direction" says Prashant Kamat, VP Business Development and Strategy at Mahindra Engineering Design and Development, one of the forerunners in the automotive design engineering space. Elaborating on the comment, Kamat explains: "We have strong fundamentals. Technology-wise we are quite competent and this apparent In our own growth - we have grown our company to almost $2 million In just 3 years, and have clients from North America, Europe and Asia-pacific. " More than the numbers, it is the quality of work that is critical for moving up the value chain. Kamat says the "low-end" meshing work is commoditised now. with almost everyone jumping on the CAD bandwagon. The real work (and the money) is in high value work such as design elements, door patterns strength calculations, aerodynamics, crash and safety testing, where experience and knowledge is required. Mahindra EngineerIng has already built competency in at least two of these areas, with crash and safety testing one of their key strengths.
     However, is the Industry getting enough manpower to be able to scale up and get more business.1b some extent, although this again is coming not from the academia alone but more from the training Institutes that are specializing In this area. This also explains the plethora of training institutes that have mushroomed across the country. Vishal Pawar, CEO and MD of VAST Engineering Solutions, a company engaged in training and consulting In this area, says: "We recognize the talent needs of the Industry, and that's why we started off with the training In this area. Competent training is one of the key requirements of the Industry that we are trying to fulfill. That's the reason we keep updating our training modules to reflect industry needs. "
     With the major automotive companies setting up their Global Design Centers (GDCs), industry experts believe already some of the cutting edge design work is being done In India. To understand this, one needs to look at the value chain first.
     According to market research firm Valuenotes, which recently came up with its report on the Automotive De. sign Engineering industry, the Mechanical design services value chain begins with Data services, that include data conversion and migration and form the lowest end, to services such as drafting, detailing and meshing, to slightly more complex services like analysis and manufacturing engineering services to the highest value services like concept design. Explains Neeraja Kandala, a researcher with ValueNotes who worked on this report: "Vendor proximity, confidentiality and protection of intellectual property are key issues when it comes to offshoring of the high value services. That's the reason why it will be some time before industry can really tap the high value services."
     All this points to greater opportw1ities for engineering students as well professionals
in this field. Some of the industry professionals in this field that the salaries for experienced professionals are already commanding premium, even over the regular IT industry jobs as the domain is relatively nascent with shortage of experience professionals in the 6+ years of experience category. Region wise, the spread is so far limited to the tier-I cities of India, namely Pune, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai and NCR region (delhi, gurgaon, noida and ghaziabad). Of these, Pune and Bangalore are currently accounting for the majority of the share of wor1c. An interesting fact is that several independent design engineering firms have mushroomed over these cities, as also the fact that automotive and ancilliary companies are also getting into this space with their own ventures. These include independent companies such as Plexion and HOYT Engineering solutions, whereas the companies from the automotive stable include Mahindra Engineering and Eicher Engineering. Other companies like Tata Technologies, that leverages the Tata Motors experience, are also stepping up the gas with Tata Technologies becoming a key player in the automotive and aerospace sector. Pune-based Neilsoft is also a unique company, which saw the boom much before others and started a dedicated engineering services practice as early as 2000. The company has since grown to over 600+ employees and carved out a niche for itself.
     Other beneficiaries of this boom include product companies, that are benefitting immensely in the-form of sale of licensed softwares to the various companies providing design engineering services. This explains the success witnessed by many US companies like AutoDesk, PTC, SDRC, Solidworks Corporation and others in India. Some resellers like Pune based DesignTech Systems have also benefitting by bundling value added services along with the product sales.
     Talking about the challenges, the industry experts believe mobility among employees due to lack of solid infrastructure is a big problem. It is also expected to ease the pressure on key cities and enable the companies to move to tier-II cities as well.
     So coming back to the billion dollar(s) question, when do we see India as the design engineering capital of the world? "In the next 5 years perhaps", says the 'eternally optimistic'Mahindra's Prashant Kate. We hope so too!