Technology for MSMEs: Businesses of all sizes have been creating a beeline for Industry 4. options to boost their efficiencies and adapt to the mammoth industrial alter that would define their future. The industrial net of issues (IIoT) has provided unprecedented possibilities of creating efficiencies across an whole program of industrial operation. However, MSMEs have been off to a seemingly slow start out towards adopting these technologies. “They first want to see the proof-of-concept of the technology,” mentioned Meenu Singhal, Vice President, Industry Business, Schneider Electric. In an interaction with TheSpuzz Online, Singhal shared MSMEs’ point of view towards automation, challenges, the market place at huge, and more. Edited excerpts beneath:
How does Schneider appear at the technologies challenges for MSMEs connected to industrial automation?
Today we have more than 6 crore MSMEs and they are not adopting the newest technologies as of now. Their access to investigation and improvement facilities is minimum and entrance to new technologies and connectivity is incredibly low. Their potential to sell solutions to a wider market place is also technologies-dependent and that what ever they are making is in compliance with regulatory requirements and is effective. So, these are some of the issues which are in terms of technologies required and are supplied by Schneider to our consumers to get greater.
What sort of options MSMEs are hunting for now?
We have noticed a fantastic quantity of convergence coming in from MSMEs in the previous couple of years as persons have began asking for digitisation and they are now hunting for brand-neutral or brand-agnostic options. Our EcoStruxure Automation Expert platform offers the finish client or the OEM a possibility to connect their current plant on the greater edge of technologies at a decrease price. Our channel partners are educated to automate a little location of their plant or the whole plant as MSMEs do not necessarily have to go for the digitisation of their whole plant. For instance, if you are a biscuit machine maker, the packaging to be redone each time anytime the size of the biscuit is reformatted. Re-accommodation of the machine is necessary that needs a humongous quantity of downtime of the machine. With our answer, just by a click of the button, the regional machine operator can get into customization of the machine, and the packaging situation can be redone automatically.
Have MSMEs been receptive to your offerings? How do you inform them that revenue can be saved right here?
They initially want to see the proof-of-idea of the technologies. So, we offer you them a virtual tour of the intelligent manufacturing facilities designed in Hyderabad and Bengaluru, Also, the quantity of power saved to make output in our and our customers’ factories has been higher. This tends to make persons realise that revenue and power can be saved by providing the identical output not only simply because one particular is utilizing effective solutions, but also simply because they are optimizing assets. Today we are speaking about total asset optimization — from the input of the raw material to the output of the factory.
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How are you tapping into the semi-urban market place and how deeply penetrated it is?
We have elevated the coverage of Schneider Electric’s go-to-market place to Tier-I, II, and III cities via our partners. So, if a plant is coming up in a location that is someplace close to Roorkie, we will be getting a companion who is close to that location and can assistance that solution. Most of these makers purchase machines from OEMs. So, machine OEMs are our initially target, and our access to finish-customers, which are MSMEs, is via these OEMs. Automation is a massive market place for India. I feel it will be about Rs 35,000-40,000 crores. The market place penetration is restricted to 25 to 30 per cent in the MSME sector. In terms of power efficiency, the penetration is greater but in terms of automation, the penetration is decrease. Giving a ballpark figure, in terms of power saving, the penetration would be more than 30 per cent and 12-15 per cent in automation. We are a international leader in operation and monitoring application platforms with more than 23 per cent market place share.
Do you feel MSMEs are hesitant to deploy such options simply because of pricing? How substantial has been the price of technologies right here?
When we speak to MSMEs about their preferred dream to expand beyond the Indian market place, the price becomes secondary at that time. It’s the worth that becomes more essential. Can their solutions show that mark of high quality, can their solutions be certified with the approval they have to have for receiving into the international market place? And if it is assisting them to enhance their profitability, which it does, then the trend in any sort of segment is that the price of the technologies is much less than 3-4 per cent of the price of the capital investment that they are investing to start out that plant.
The government has been focusing on decreasing carbon emissions and switching to clean power. Have you engaged with them to extend your options? Also, how do you appear at it in light of the Atmanirbhar Bharat programme?
We have a group that is incredibly substantially connected with the government bodies. We are in touch with the power, EV, and manufacturing sectors of the government of various segments, which includes water, wastewater, energy grid, automation, and electrical manufacturing to showcase what we offer you. Now is the time for “Make in India’ or ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat’ which has been strongly promoted. Manufacturers in India really feel more elevated to invest and adopt technologies. So, this is the assistance from the government to not only enhance manufacturing but also enhance automation in manufacturing.