Q: What, according to you, are the skill gaps persist in the automotive industry still and how is ASDC addressing this?

Sanghi: Automotive manufacturers are currently facing several challenges. With increased pressure to meet customer demand for more personalised designs, they are tasked with creating a more flexible production environment, reducing engineering time and costs, and accelerating the market to remain competitive.

With massive technological transformations taking place across the sector, companies need to keep pace with the ever-evolving landscape to meet the ever-evolving demands of modern-day work.

Acquiring new skills is the key to sustain in this dynamic landscape. It is a continuous effort of both the institute and the corporation to fill the skill gap. Although there are programmes, they are not reflecting the change at the same pace as the change seen by the industry.

Companies today need people who can adapt and develop themselves to the changing technology. Whether automotive or otherwise manufacturers have recognised the importance of creating a workforce of intelligent problem solvers. In addition to these, more manufacturers are now focusing on hiring and training talents that can sustain advances in technology and drive investment. We at ASDC are doing a lot of training activities along with our teams of various zones, including holding webinars and launching various courses.

We are also continually training our team members and associates and dealers to do more reviews on the digital platforms or dealers to focus on digital retail; they were not getting used to it.

They preferred to be physically present, talking face to face, but now this lockdown has left no other option but to adopt the digital route.

Q: Customers are well informed now, and they finalise the model and variant even before reaching the showroom. In this scenario, what kind of skills needed for dealerships?

Sanghi: With ever-increasing ways to capture your customers’ attention across multiple channels, a partner specialising in the customer journey can be an invaluable asset to your business.

Considering the experience from the consumer’s perspective allows the dealer to compete with other, less traditional models.

Social distancing will bring dynamic change to the dealership business. No longer will customers feel comfortable walking into showrooms. Now, the reverse will happen, and OEMs and dealers will have to reach out to customers even more. And going digital will help them do just that.

Sales channels, dealers and OEMs per se will have to increase the transparency level dramatically. That’s because customers will now prefer to engage with them virtually, which in turn means there has to be digital.

Various experiences, like test drives of new cars, which has been a very popular method of selling a passenger vehicle, will be a much-less-used tool for sales. Likewise, a physical inspection of vehicles undergoing maintenance will take a backseat, and the OEM/dealer will have to convey images to customers about the work being done, either in real-time or in some other manner.

Q: Would the new trend catalyse unemployment further?

Sanghi: The pandemic has brought forth the concept of work from home to enable social distancing, which earlier would never have been thought to be possible for a vast majority of the jobs. You will need to train them (workforce) on how to use digital tools, and train the entire ecosystem to monitor the efficiency.

The need for top-notch cybersecurity is vital; one has to be absolutely sure that the data is secured and not misused. Data integrity needs to be 100 percent. Organisations will need to upskill existing staff to be digital and tech-savvy. All the while, the focus has to be on the data which is supposed to be the oil of the economy that is secured and owned by the owner, and not someone else.

Q: How do you match the curriculum with the ever-evolving customer needs and changing regulatory environment?

Sanghi: While the automotive industry may be facing some challenges, digital manufacturing and technological progress are enabling automotive engineers to deliver products to market faster than ever before.

This is easing the competitive pressure on car manufacturers, and going some way to fill the void left by the shortage of skilled engineers.

COVID-19 has introduced digitalisation as the key to the future. For organisations and the country, this means a huge opportunity to upskill and reskill our workforce using digital tools. This will not only help the country stabilise manufacturing activities, but will also help to improve the standard of living, that well allows for economic growth.

Q: What are the challenges you face with emerging technology trends like electrified, automated, shared technology as each of these elements needs specialised training supported by adequate infrastructure?

Sanghi: A big change happening because of digitalisation and COVID-19 has just helped increase the focus. The current lockdown has brought the focus on skilling and digitalisation into sharp focus. Smart industrialisation is here to say; one can look at their people’s daily lives, particularly in urban and some parts of rural India, to experience that they are now more reliant on digital tools than they were in pre-COVID-19 days.

While skills shortage is an issue far wider than the automotive industry, reasons can be identified why this sector has a lack of skilled workers. For the manufacturing sector, it means moving from labour-intensive methodologies to automation. COVID has accelerated the growth of the cyber-physical world. India should marry men with the machine to enhance productivity. Highly skewed income distribution and a lack of respect for labour remain a big concern. Lack of respect leads to lower productivity and efficiency, which serve to robs India of a competitive edge.

Q: The technological changes that are coming off late are mostly the result of either legislation or regulation. In this scenario, how do you see ASDC transform in the future?

Sanghi: Demand-driven skilling has been the focus of every industry. At ASDC, we’ve conceptualised the digital platform in such a way that it provides all the information together, at one place. For example, the availability of jobs in a sub-sector, what is the prediction for upcoming job roles and what are the skills in demand. It will provide links to all our partners wherein they can share their projections and find the right candidates.

There have been many modifications to the apprenticeship programmes, and these are rightly intended in making it inclusive. We are happy with the Government making these phenomenal improvements, and we hope the industry members engage more apprentices. For the automotive sector, ASDC is the delivery partner for apprenticeships. We also see a lot of enthusiasm from component manufacturers and dealers to explore apprenticeship as an option to get a skilled workforce.

Q: Today, almost all vehicles, including trucks, are connected in one way or the other. What are the new challenges that emerge out of these connected vehicles? What is the solution from ASDC?

Sanghi: The automotive industry is converging with the information and communication technology (ICT) industry at a rapidly increasing rate. Technology is reshaping the global automotive sector. In the future, cars will become computers on wheels as tech players’ move into the automotive sector to leverage their existing capabilities.

When we are talking about the challenges, it can be the difference in lifecycles in the automotive and the mobile industry is a serious challenge for the future of connected cars. New features, such as operating system upgrades and new applications, are provided almost constantly for the smartphone, whereas car manufacturers work on five-year cycles. The advent of connected cars will dramatically change the dealership model as a whole. Salespeople must plan to spend an hour or more teaching customers how to use their car’s advanced technology.

Also, issues such as privacy, security, the cost of deploying a system, data ownership, driver distraction, and equity must be taken into consideration in the technology of connected vehicles/cars.

Q: How is ASDC preparing itself to support the maintenance and repair of electric vehicles?

Sanghi: Complex maintenance is one of the most common concerns that affect electric vehicle (EV) adoption. In reality, however, the intervals between each service in an EV are almost the same as for regular vehicles, and those services are usually less complicated. Traditional vehicles have hundreds of mechanical and moving parts, whereas an EV contains far fewer. Parts of an EV are generally easy to replace and don’t wear out as quickly.

The only major “potential” expense in EV maintenance is replacing the battery. As the vehicle reaches 100,000 miles, it may have lost up to 20% of its range.

Some batteries are designed to replace modules in contrast to the whole battery, but it depends on the way the car is made. Although it may take significantly less time to perform a service on an EV, there are other differences in the service process that can affect an OEM’s aftersales business.

We at ASDC have upgraded our training systems to look after the present modes of maintenance.

The way forward is our entire training programme is under review by industry partners. We have expert groups in R&D, manufacturing; they are in the process of reviewing all our occupational standards and upgrading them, not only for the present but also for the future.

Q: What is your view on data storing wirelessly that may affect multi-brand third-party service centres; how do you see ASDC playing a role in this?

Sanghi: Wireless connectivity for the vehicle may pose serious cybersecurity threats to a moving vehicle.

However, the issue of multi-brand third-party service centres, including service aggregator platforms, are here to stay.

ASDC in partnership with some of the industry partners is keen on providing Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) for existing manpower as well as upskilling training of existing workers through blended digital learning modules for new technologies linked to new norms like BS-VI standards of emission, etc.

Q: What is ASDC’s work on conserving resources like use of remanufactured parts?

Sanghi: All stakeholders, including the current Government, have felt the need for a well-balanced vehicle scrappage policy; we expect to see its roll-out soon. This can boost a lot in refurbished and remanufactured parts. It opens a new sub-domain, generating employment and entrepreneurship opportunities. Once the policy contours are known, the training qualifications and standards will be worked upon by ASDC.

Q: What are the new courses ASDC is planning to conduct in the near future?

Sanghi: ASDC has started work on new job roles in the areas of Industry 4.0 for manufacturing and maintenance areas and the entire domain of electric vehicles. We are modifying some of the existing job roles to update the new technological changes and disruptions that have taken place in this industry. (MT)

WACKER is presenting a portfolio of battery electric vehicle safety innovations at the Battery Show in Stuttgart, Germany, running from June 9 to June 11. Among the products featured at the company’s Hall 1, Booth K45, are a ceramifying silicone for thermal barriers, thermally conductive potting compounds for power electronics and materials under the ELASTOSIL, SEMICOSIL, SILRES and WACKER Silgel brands. The ceramifying silicone notably enhances heat and flame resistance, while the potting compounds enable effective temperature control with minimal sedimentation, allowing processing after long storage without complex pretreatment.

New potting compounds for thermal management take centre stage as another key exhibit. The spotlight falls on ELASTOSIL RT 7616 TC and ELASTOSIL RT 7624 TC, both filled addition-curing silicone elastomers that cure at room temperature, enabling energy-saving handling of large components. ELASTOSIL RT 7616 TC offers a thermal conductivity of 1.6 W/mK, while ELASTOSIL RT 7624 TC achieves 2.4 W/mK.

Thermally conductive potting compounds must balance on-spec thermal conductivity with low viscosity, but low viscosity can cause particulate fillers to sediment and cake after prolonged storage. Redispersing such fillers is time-consuming and may require special mixing equipment. WACKER has now eliminated these concerns with the optimised rheological properties of its new products, making sedimentation and agglomeration effects irrelevant for customers.

Even if fillers settle under unfavourable transport or storage conditions, standard mixing equipment can easily redisperse them. ELASTOSIL RT 7616 TC and ELASTOSIL RT 7624 TC feature low viscosities of 5,500 and 8,000 mPa•s, respectively, allowing quick, bubble-free filling of gaps as small as a few hundred micrometres. Their room-temperature curing eliminates the need for ovens regardless of component size.

These heat-resistant, low-emission formulations are primarily used in electromobility battery chargers, DC/DC converters and inverters for thermal management of discrete components like coils or inductors. Other silicones for electromobility include SILRES MK, a methyl silicone resin for mechanical and thermal barriers and ELASTOSIL CM 18x potting compounds for side potting of cells and top potting of pressure-relief vents, providing electrical and thermal insulation without impairing vent function.

ELASTOSIL R 531/60, a ceramifying silicone rubber for busbar insulation in high-voltage batteries, rounds out the offerings. This extrudable material improves electric vehicle safety by ceramifying in a fire, encasing busbars in a ceramic layer to maintain electrical insulation. WACKER is demonstrating all these solutions live at the Stuttgart exhibition.

ELANTAS Beck India Ltd. has announced a strategic push to strengthen its speciality chemicals portfolio in response to the country’s rapidly expanding data centre infrastructure sector. The company, recognised for its expertise in electrical insulation and electronic protection, aims to support the evolving technical demands of this high-growth market.

The firm’s product range includes wire enamels, high and low voltage insulation materials, varnishes, resins, potting compounds and electronic protection solutions. These materials serve critical components across data centre ecosystems, such as transformers, generators, motors, power distribution units, cooling systems, server room electronics and battery energy storage systems.

India’s data centre capacity is growing swiftly due to rising artificial intelligence workloads, cloud computing, 5G rollouts and stricter data localisation norms. As facilities shift towards higher density and always-on operations, the need for reliable electrical infrastructure has intensified, placing greater emphasis on thermal management, cooling efficiency, electronics protection and uninterrupted energy storage.

Leveraging over 70 years of experience in speciality chemicals, ELANTAS Beck India Ltd. continues to enhance its capabilities through application-driven innovation, technology transfers and ongoing material development. The company remains focused on aligning with emerging industry standards for efficiency, reliability and performance across critical electrical and electronic applications.

Anurag Roy, Managing Director, ELANTAS Beck India Ltd., said, “As India’s data centre ecosystem continues to expand, the demand for reliable and high-performance electrical infrastructure is increasing significantly. This is creating strong opportunities for advanced insulation and protection solutions across critical applications that enable uninterrupted operations of these facilities. With our proven chemistry in electrical insulation and electronic protection, ELANTAS is well-positioned to support this evolution through application-focused chemistries designed for reliability, efficiency and long-term operational performance.”

Greaves Finance, the EV-focused non-banking financial company (NBFC) subsidiary of Greaves Cotton, has announced the successful deployment of its previously sanctioned institutional debt of INR 2.23 billion.

The capital injection, executed during the April-March 2026 fiscal cycle, has accelerated the retail lending footprint of its multi-brand electric vehicle financing platform, ev.fin, scaling its physical presence to 74 cities across India. The entity plans to surpass 80 operational cities by July 2026.

The INR 2.23 billion institutional capital was raised through a calculated asset-liability mix consisting of Listed Non-Convertible Debentures (NCDs) and structured term loans. The fundraise was anchored by a consortium of tier-one institutional lenders and asset management firms, including AK Capital, Northern Arc Investment Managers, AU Small Finance Bank, Ambit Finvest, MAS Financial Services and Maanveeya.

Backed by this capital deployment and rising consumer credit demand, the company's financial metrics as of March 2026 stand at INR 5.22 billion of Managed Assets Under Management (AUM), cumulative loan disbursements exceeding INR 7.74 billion, which includes over 55,000 active retail and fleet accounts.

Traditional automotive financing heavily weights a borrower's static income profile. In contrast, ev.fin utilises a differentiated, OEM-agnostic asset underwriting model that structures loan terms based on the real-time thermal health, degradation curves, and residual resale value of the EV battery pack.

The platform is directly embedded into the point-of-sale (POS) dealerships of major electric two-wheeler (E2W) and three-wheeler (E3W) original equipment manufacturers, including Ather Energy, Ampere, River, Hero MotoCorp, Bajaj Auto, TVS Motor Company, Suzuki and Ultraviolette.

The platform's proprietary underwriting framework allows it to issue specialised, risk-adjusted credit instruments that track the entire functional lifecycle of an electric vehicle:

P B Sunil Kumar, Executive Director & CEO, Greaves Finance, said, “The deployment of substantial funds from our existing INR 2.23 billion, marks an important milestone for ev.fin and reflects strong institutional and investor trust. Our institutional partnerships and investor endorsement have provided a robust foundation, which demonstrates support for our differentiated business model and is a ringing endorsement of the way we have decided to scale the business."

"As India’s electric mobility market accelerates, innovative and accessible financing solutions will remain central to unlocking the next phase of growth. Recognising this potential, we are actively working toward expanding our lender ecosystem to support our next growth cycle while maintaining robust underwriting and portfolio quality,” he concluded.

The Mexican federal government has officially unveiled the prototype for Olinia, the country's first domestic electric vehicle (EV) brand. Coordinated by the Ministry of Science, Humanities, Technology, and Innovation (SECIHTI) and manufactured in Puebla, the project represents Mexico’s strategic shift from a pure export-oriented assembly hub to a developer of national intellectual property says a report by Mexico Business News.

Commercial production for Olinia is slated to begin in 2027, with the brand looking to challenge the historical dominance of foreign manufacturing frameworks.

Claudia Sheinbaum, President, Mexico, said, “Olinia represents the seed of a new innovation ecosystem built from Mexico."

The initiative directly addresses Mexico's long-standing reliance on final-assembly manufacturing under trade agreements like the USMCA. While countries like China capitalised on state coordination and strict supply chain control to build massive domestic EV ecosystems, Mexico historically lagged in capturing high-value-add automotive IP.

To bridge this gap, SECIHTI orchestrated an intensive 18-month engineering phase, uniting academic and public research powerhouses – including the Instituto Politécnico Nacional (IPN), Tecnológico Nacional de México (TecNM), UNAM and UPAEP.

The brand's debut model, the Olinia Uno, targets urban utility and aggressive affordability, aiming for a market segment largely overlooked by global legacy automakers.

The Olinia Uno is expected to cost approximately MXN 150,000 or USD 8,600 (INR 716,466), comes with a 14.7 kWh battery, with a claimed range of approximately 125 km per charge and a top speed of 50 kmph. The EV is expected to offer a low running cost of around MXN 0.5 or INR 2.74 per km.

In terms of features, the EV comes with a 7-inch centre display, Bluetooth 5.0, USB/USB-C ports, 6-passenger capacity and wheelchair accessibility.

Operating under a mixed-ownership corporate structure, the Olinia project is currently seeking MXN 200 million (USD 11.4 million) in private capital to transition from prototype to commercial manufacturing. Facility construction in Puebla is scheduled to begin between August and September 2026.

The plant is expected to debut with an initial capacity of 20,000 units per year, aiming to scale to 50,000 units within four years and eventually peak at 100,000 units annually. Olinia will launch with 50 percent localisation, with a mandate to hit 75 percent localisation by 2030.

The project is led by Director Roberto Capuano Tripp, with the initial phase involves deploying 2,000 charging points across Mexico City, the State of Mexico and Puebla to support the mass transition of public transport and taxi fleets.

To accommodate the rollout, federal authorities are collaborating with the Ministry of Economy to draft a new regulatory framework specifically governing low- and medium-speed urban vehicles. Furthermore, the vehicle's battery design incorporates a circular-economy strategy: power cells will be repurposed for residential energy storage before undergoing final chemical recycling at processing facilities in Sonora.