INDUSTRIAL AUTOMATION – A COMPONENT MANUFACTURER'S PERSPECTIVE

Automation is a key factor in the growth of any sector. Anil Kumar, Director, Inovance Technology India, takes us through an insightful look at automation in the manufacturing sector and its short and long term effects on the economy

- Kruti Bharadva

Where do you see India in terms of automation in the manufacturing sector? Give us insight from your industry.

I believe there will be a strong future for the Indian manufacturing sector, and that this future will be highly automated. This is something I see both in a wider sense, and in my own professional life. In the wider sense it is clear that India, with its young, large, and growing population, and with the large number of skilled technology and engineering graduates we produce, has big strengths that will lead to manufacturing growth.

But in a professional sense I see the potential too, through the strong and ever-growing performance from our company’s local industrial customers. Our company, Inovance, sells industrial automation kit such as AC Drives, HMIs, PLCs, Servos to factories and machine builders, and we’ve seen significant sales growth since the relaxation of COVID restrictions.

It is also clear that, as Indian industrialists, our government is behind us. We’ve seen this recently in announcements surrounding the new national budget. One example is the new ‘go vocal for local’ campaign. What I see in this campaign, and the accompanying funding for Indian manufacturing that has been made available, is less an attempt to shut out foreign business, and more an attempt to support Indian companies to compete with global manufacturers, and also to increase their exports.

What role does automation play in India’s small and medium-sized OEM’s?