READY FOR FUTURE

Solutions under Industry 4.0 will form the backbone of our future production ecosystem, says Mojmír Hájek, Technical Director, I-P Production and Logistics, Škoda Auto Volkswagen India (ŠAVWIPL)

- Niranjan Mudholkar

What have been the key challenges faced by you as the Technical Director, I-P Production and Logistics in the last one year since the advent of the Covid-19 pandemic? How have you been overcoming them?

At Škoda Auto Volkswagen India (ŠAVWIPL), our employees come before business. At the onset of the pandemic, we had to establish new processes for work in the shops and in the offices to make the plant safe for our people and suppliers before we resumed operations. This was as essential as it was to reach our business goals.

The subsequent travel restrictions also hindered our operations and day-to-day business had to be re-invented. We had to be really creative as the situation continued to deteriorate and fast actions were required.

We had to adapt new communication standards; many face-to-face meetings moved to the virtual world of video conferencing on Zoom/Skype/Teams. The communication infrastructure of India helped a great deal.

Since our technology and equipment suppliers could not turn up in person, we had to find ways of remote online communication, not only with people but with the machines as well. Luckily, the Volkswagen Group is present in many parts of the world, so we could use help of our Group partners in meeting the foreign suppliers in their manufacturing locations, perform technology, equipment, and tool pre-acceptance checks before their dispatch to India under the group standards.

I must not forget the long hours of work by the whole team to make all this happen. It was a matter of an all company mind shift.