Schneider Electric's Upcoming Smart Factories In India | NDTV Profit
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00:00The world is talking about energy transition and net zero targets.
00:13Machine learning, IoT and artificial intelligence have become the buzzword.
00:18But what exactly is the application and where exactly are they used?
00:22How are they getting integrated into the systems and the processes?
00:25If you want to know all this, this is the place to be.
00:28This is Schneider Electric, India's Hyderabad-based manufacturing plant and an innovation hub.
00:34This place has been recognized as a sustainability lighthouse by the World Economic Forum.
00:40This place has been helping Indian government achieve the net zero target and also help
00:45all these products being integrated into various sectors.
00:49We have with us Mr. Deepak Sharma, who is the managing director of Schneider Electric
00:54and he will be talking to us and taking us through this plant, the innovation hub, and
00:58tell us, our audiences, what exactly this plant is made up for and what the relevance
01:03is going ahead.
01:04Welcome to NDTV Profit.
01:05Thank you Vikas.
01:07Welcome and welcome to the NDTV Profit crew to Schneider Electric Hyderabad plant.
01:13Very proud to share that this is one of the most prestigious jewels in our crown.
01:19We say we are proud because this has been recognized as a sustainable lighthouse factory
01:26in 2023 by the World Economic Forum and an advanced lighthouse factory by the World Economic
01:32Forum in 2022.
01:33There are only two in the country and one is with us, so it's a very proud moment.
01:38This is a showcase of how technology and humans have come together to build something which
01:47is going to build the future in a sustainable way.
01:51What we showcase here is how technology of Schneider Electric, what we call as an EcoStruxure
01:56architecture with connected layer of products, our edge controls, and our software layers
02:01with machine learning, AI, and predictive analysis can put together to solve the problem
02:08of our needs of energy growth and expansions in manufacturing while delivering a sustainability
02:14and achieving low carbon emissions.
02:18So this is what we want to show you in the next few minutes.
02:23This plant produces our three critical components like air circuit breakers, MCCBs, control
02:31gear, vacuum circuit breakers, which are mission critical for our infrastructure.
02:37So welcome again and looking forward to some exciting conversations.
02:40Right, I mean, you have already given a gist of it, but I want to understand like, you
02:43know, what exactly you are doing at this plant and what is so unique?
02:48What has led this to be called as a lighthouse of innovation?
02:52What are the critical points that you can talk to our audience?
02:55So very important, right?
02:58Manufacturing is something which we know in our industry or in our eras for long.
03:03I think the era we are living, which we call it the fourth revolution, the fourth industrial
03:07revolution, where we have brought data connectivity to the core of our manufacturing.
03:13What you see here as one of our use cases, and this use case is not only for us.
03:19Actually, we solve these problems with our customers.
03:22But this use case, which we demonstrate in our factory, in our own factory, is connecting
03:27the technology, which is, again, the connected products, the layer of our edge controls and
03:33the softwares by delivering technology to solve the challenges of tomorrow.
03:39Now, what do I mean by that, if you're asking what is that difference?
03:44The difference is that when we produce or we manufacture, whatever we do, we consume
03:50energy.
03:51And the story of Schneider, where we support a lot is on the energy efficiency, how more
03:56electric, more digital is equal to sustainability.
04:00And that's the showcase here.
04:01So with our EcoStruxure platforms, we're able to deploy those technologies and achieve really
04:08measurable results.
04:10And these measurable results, in terms of increasing our manufacturing efficiencies,
04:16we have seen the quality of our products going up.
04:19Our field failure rates have gone down by like 50 percent, our manufacturing defects
04:23are down by 90 percent.
04:25So that is helping us in the manufacturing.
04:27Beyond that, we have also achieved a strong carbon control of all what we do.
04:33So our carbon emissions are down by more than 50 percent, our waste water reduction is by
04:3950 percent.
04:40And these technologies have helped us to reduce our carbon to emissions by 61 percent.
04:48Our energy consumption is down by 52 percent.
04:51Our reduction in manufacturing defect rate, MDR, is by 91 percent.
04:55And our water consumption is low by 57 percent.
04:59So all these technologies which we are showcasing here has helped us to deliver more because
05:06our productivity is up by 54 percent by almost using half of our resources.
05:11And that's the equation of what technology can bring to manufacturing.
05:15You spoke about carbon emission reduction and also the role that innovation and digitization
05:21is playing into this.
05:23So can you talk to us about your smart technologies where you are helping Indian government also
05:28and other sectors to achieve this?
05:31What are these smart technologies?
05:32Like you spoke about smart meters and other, you know, for airports, building automation
05:36and others.
05:37Can you talk to our audience about that?
05:39So Schneider Electric's story is for multiple segments.
05:43Basically, we focus on four segments and where we stand today is the industrial segment where
05:48we see 30 percent of our carbon footprints comes from industries.
05:53Building is another big one which is almost around 40 percent of our carbon emissions
05:57comes from buildings.
05:58And based on these segments, we have built architectures to solve the problem.
06:03And these architectures are for power, architectures for plant, architectures for machines, architectures
06:10for buildings.
06:12And then this industry where I'm standing today is the accumulation of all those technologies
06:19in one group and deploying those technologies.
06:23And then what we do is we will be happy to show you our unique command center which integrates
06:28all the, all those technologies under one software, which is our offer from our brand
06:35Aveva.
06:36And then we integrate all of them together to solve those problems.
06:40Now, this is what happens at the machine, but the problem of energy is not only at the
06:45plant level.
06:46Let's, Schneider does everything from grid to plug.
06:51So when the energy is transmitted, we don't produce energy.
06:54But when energy is available at a substation level, from that level to a home or residential
07:02at a plug level is where we can bring architectures to solve these problems.
07:08So be it a substation, we can also help the substations to become more smarter, what we
07:14call a smart grid.
07:16With all the focus of the government of India of integrating more non-fossil energy into
07:22the grid, you know, we need more grid stability because we will be integrating non-fossil
07:27with our existing fossil.
07:29We would need a grid infrastructure, which would be most integrated.
07:34And with the ADMS technologies, advanced distributed management systems, we should be able to bring
07:40energy both in and out from the grid, which is what we call with our solutions like net
07:45metering, smart metering.
07:47We then take this technology to how do we transform it, how do a medium voltage, how
07:51do a low voltage.
07:53And this is what we call as power train.
07:55So the government initiatives of making the energy or the expansion on the research, the
08:05government initiative of investment in the infra and the development of the country and
08:10build a 7 trillion economy by 2030 would need these technologies to be deployed at
08:16grid level, at the manufacturing level, at building level, at residential level, at new
08:22energy level, solar, for example, which is what we know already enough and government
08:28is falling on the installation of 1 crore houses.
08:33But how a household can become a micro grid in a small hamlet.
08:37And this we have already deployed in some villages in Jharkhand, where these villages
08:42are now running on a micro grid solution, which not only produces energy for lamps and
08:46lights, but actually running a small medium scale industry to process and make livelihood.
08:53So all these initiatives of the government from grid to plug is where Schneider Electric
08:59plays and brings these technologies in usage.
09:02I have two additional questions.
09:04You spoke about the command centers, right?
09:07The command centers has helped you to monitor the entire thing as far as the emissions and
09:11everything, especially defect monitoring and everything.
09:14So what are the use cases that you can offer to our audiences, which has helped your clients
09:18to bring down this kind of emissions or reduction in overall carbon targets?
09:24So when it comes to use cases, I mean, I'm very proud to say that our factories are our
09:28best use cases.
09:29Out of 31 factories in the country, five are already smart factory.
09:33Hyderabad is what we are standing, as we said, is recognized by World Economic Forum
09:37already as advanced and a sustainable lighthouse.
09:40Our Chennai factory really got a replication of golden peacock for energy efficiency.
09:45So we have five smart factories already in the country.
09:47So this is our first use cases.
09:49Now, these deployment of use cases at customer level is also increasing, and we believe this
09:55is possible.
09:57We have demonstrated a very strong case of our technology being used in building segments
10:02with our customers called Capgemini.
10:05And today with one energy command center, they are now able to measure the consumption
10:10of energy, water, waste, everything in their campuses.
10:16And they have reduced 29% of their carbon emissions in their campuses.
10:21So these are type of examples.
10:22We have recently done another project with Tanishq, where we have also saved their energy
10:26consumption by 20%.
10:28There are lots of more.
10:29I am not allowed to name.
10:31I don't have the permission to name them.
10:33But the expansion of and deployment of these technologies is actually going multi-fold
10:40in solving the one challenge.
10:42How do we achieve as an ecosystem, as a country, our net zero commitments?
10:46Right.
10:47You also spoke about, you know, reaching out to small, small villages and setting up microgrids.
10:52So can you talk a little bit more in detail what these microgrids do and what is the cost
10:57of installing these microgrids?
10:59Who pays for them and what's the kind of payback period that people can look at?
11:03So first, I think the point I want to make is, if you go to those villages, and I think
11:10we are blessed that we don't have the same challenges because we live in big towns.
11:14But I was privileged to see the hardship of those villages a few weeks ago in Jharkhand.
11:21And these villages are changing the livelihoods of our people.
11:25And I would want to respect all the women, because somehow they are the ones who struggle
11:31or fight the more, be it cooking, be it feeding kids and making the time on the education
11:39with the kids and then also earning.
11:42So what did microgrid do in these small villages?
11:45I mean, we produce energy by solar and this is relatively becoming, I would say, a known
11:52technology piece.
11:54What we have done with smart energy distribution center in this village, that now we take the
12:00energy from the solar, we store, so we use what we need.
12:04What we don't use, we store it.
12:06And then what we, during the day, what we produce, we use water pumping to bring water
12:11to the fields, water to homes, but more importantly, we have installed a micro, small-scale industry.
12:18So now, for example, the extruders are crushing mustard seeds to build mustard oil.
12:26And the same work was done by women carrying mustard on their head, walking kilometers,
12:30and then walking with the oil in the night.
12:32This happens in the village, removing the layer from the rice, right?
12:38They used to do by hand, waking up four in the morning.
12:41Now it happens through machines all powered by these microgrids.
12:44So microgrid is actually changing the life of these villages.
12:49And of course, we have electricity, not in abundance, but these microgrids compensate
12:54when they are not available, electricity is not available, changing the livelihood of
12:59these communities.
13:00And also very sustainable.
13:01And it's all sustainable because we are all doing through solar, fully sustainable.
13:06They also have an e-rickshaw, which is also powered by what we produce, and the transportation
13:12of all the production they do is going to the main cities in e-rickshaw, which is again
13:18an electric vehicle, which is again a sign of sustainability.
13:23Now, given the kind of infrastructure that you have set up over here and other factories,
13:28how do you think that this smart kind of factories will help overall increasing India's contribution
13:34of manufacturing to the GDP?
13:37And what is Schneider's contribution to that?
13:39So I think Schneider plays a good, as any other economy, I think Schneider plays an
13:48important role in all the, in this equation.
13:52First as us, we already have 31 factories.
13:56And as we talk, we are building five more.
13:59And I don't think we're going to stop there because the market in India is very promising.
14:03And we see once this wave of investments are over, the next wave should come to grow
14:09with the trajectory of the India growth story.
14:13And what we produce in India, almost 70% of it is also exported to 30 countries.
14:21So we are exporting out of India, which makes India as one of the strongest manufacturing
14:26hub in India, and also India for the global.
14:29So of course, we are expanding and going to contribute our small piece of manufacturing
14:35expansion in the country, which is the equation from 16 to 25.
14:39But beyond that, our second role is how do we create others, the ecosystem of startups,
14:45our ecosystem of other industries to come to the scale by using technology to be competitive
14:51to the other parts of the world.
14:53So what we import today from some parts of the Asia specifically, how can we localize
14:59more in this country?
15:01And today, I think we proudly say that with Schneider Electric Technologies, we can help
15:06the medium, micro, small scale industries, the manufacturing industries on bigger scale
15:14to produce, automize, digitize their manufacturing plants so that they can achieve scalability,
15:21which is indirectly proportional to the cost and help you to be more competitive in India
15:27itself.
15:28And of course, do its sustainability through our EcoStruxure architectures.
15:32So we have twofold play in this initiative.
15:35Because we spoke about a lot of things, we spoke about AI, we spoke about innovation.
15:40But AI is a very generic term.
15:42So I would like to know from you, this is a smart, innovative hub that you have created.
15:48How are you using this or integrating this AI and machine learning into your products?
15:53Can you explain to our audience what exactly this robot does and what exactly is the purpose?
16:00So let me take an example here.
16:03This is a mechanism, which is the heart of the breaker.
16:06And this has 200 components and very, very critical part of the breaker because breaker
16:13itself is a mission critical product.
16:15And it's the heart of the breaker.
16:17What exactly is the breaker that you're talking about?
16:18So breaker is like ACB, which job is to protect the installations in case of a fault.
16:26And of course, protect the installation and people in case there's a fault.
16:29So that's the basic part of a breaker.
16:31And of course, it does a lot of more things to help us to operate with efficiency.
16:36Now, this particular component or the mechanism, which has almost 200 child components is core.
16:44And the quality and the performance resiliency is key.
16:51So what we have deployed in this example is a cobot.
16:53It's not a robot, right?
16:55It's a more human close machine.
16:58And we actually measure it almost all the parameters of the 200 child components through AI.
17:10Everything is then flashed to our softwares with the usage of AI.
17:15We check the reliability of the components and then ensure this is ready to be added
17:21in our breakers.
17:22So AI, as I said earlier, is not only coming as an analytical layer in our architectures,
17:30but also being deployed at the manufacturing, in our process, in our sales tools to achieve
17:35better performances or higher efficiencies in the way we serve our customers.
17:42There's a strong focus on skill development.
17:45No, I mean, for a manufacturing hub like this, you'll require a lot of skilled workforce
17:50also.
17:51So there is a requirement at the India level, national level also, global level, and also
17:57at companies like this or factories like this.
18:00So what are your plans as far as skill development is concerned?
18:04And also what training of your workforce?
18:07So competency of our people is at the core of what we do, because we believe people are
18:11our most important resources in the company.
18:15And we have a full scale training center, we'll be happy to showcase where all our employees
18:22are trained before they go on the line.
18:25And there are trainings at different levels.
18:28So you go through multi-level training as you progress on the production lines in the
18:35company or in the production lines.
18:38Now beyond that, we have also committed ourselves to upskill the youth of the country.
18:44And here we are very proud to talk about, we have almost 530 plus vocational schools
18:49where we are training the youth on energy efficiency, on manufacturing, on these technologies.
18:55And so far we have trained almost 200,000 plus youth, which actually have got employment
19:01or became entrepreneurs in the electric industry.
19:07So it's a core of our story.
19:09We train our people in our factories for ourselves, but we also train the youth of tomorrow, either
19:15to come and join Schneider Electric or join anyone else in the industry.
19:19So what is the current employee strength for Schneider in India?
19:22And how much you are looking to scale that up to?
19:25So first I want to start with this plant, which is, as I said, this is one of the most
19:29prestigious jewel in our crown.
19:32We have almost 1600 employees in this plant and two third of them are women, right?
19:38And this is at blue collar level and at the white collar level.
19:42So that makes us very, very committed to give the equal chance to both the genders in the
19:49society.
19:50And we are committed to bring 50% of our new hires from women genders, we are committed
19:59on 40% of our front line managers to be women and 30% leadership roles to be also women.
20:07That's what we have committed and it's one of our measurable index, which we follow as
20:11our commitment to sustainability.
20:15In India, we have almost 38,000 people and we are growing.
20:19In the next phase of our expansion, we believe we would hire another 6,500 employees with
20:26the expansion of what manufacturing we need directly.
20:30And of course, plus indirect employment, which will come to our suppliers who help us to
20:36manufacture these new products.
20:38So of course, India remains our biggest population of our employees.
20:44We are very proud that beyond the expansion in our factories, we have just opened our
20:48biggest innovation campus in Bangalore, Avenia.
20:53And this is going to house 8,000 people, primarily from our digital and R&D development in one
20:59campus.
21:00That's amazing.
21:01The other thing is requirement for technology.
21:05One is that you are developing your own technology also, but there is a lot of, you know, startups
21:10which are coming up, you know, which are also very good.
21:13So is there any kind of alliance that you're looking to form with startups for your technology
21:18development?
21:19So at Schneider, everything we do, we do with partners.
21:23I think collaboration and working together with an ecosystem is at the core of the company.
21:30What we do in India, a big part of our business is with partners.
21:34So we always believe in using the strength of all to solve a problem.
21:41And when it comes to technology, we are very happy to share that even in this factory,
21:46we have a small innovation startup room, we'll be happy to showcase and share with you that
21:51room, where startups from the country come, solve a real problem or use case, deliver
21:59a solution and test it.
22:02And very happy to also share that three of those startups solutions have been successfully
22:08deployed at Schneider Electric group level.
22:11So they are no more only a Hyderabad startup, their solutions are now working in our global
22:17factories around the world.
22:20And thanks to the support of the government, the program called T-Hub actually helps us
22:25to accelerate the association with the startups to use the strength of the wider ecosystem.
22:33So there is also a lot of technology related development that's happening, you know, and
22:38for a plant like this, you need.
22:39So are you looking at developing everything indigenously, or you are also looking at partners
22:44for this kind of technology?
22:46Well, so at Schneider Electric, we have always believed to work with partners, actually partners
22:52are at the foundation of our company.
22:54A big part of our business we do in this country is with our partners.
22:58So there is no shyness in using the ecosystem of our experts around us.
23:05And that's why we also collaborate with external companies when it comes to technology.
23:11In this particular factory, we have a very strong use cases, a lab, which we'll be happy
23:16to show you eyes, where we bring startups who works with us on a use case, a real problem,
23:24and then solve it.
23:25And we're very happy to announce that out of those multiple use cases, three startups
23:31have gone and now become our global suppliers.
23:35And these technologies of AMR, the autonomous mobile robots, 5G, on auto AI, are these couple
23:45of use cases which are global today.
23:48So yes, we work with partners, we are very happy to use the knowledge which exists in
23:55the ecosystem, and we bring them together.
23:58And we want to thank the T-Hub initiative of the government, which we have leveraged
24:03to develop this part of ecosystem in this plant.
24:09Right.
24:10Can you also talk about the kind of technology or the product that they have contributed
24:13to Schneider?
24:15So in terms of the technologies, we're talking about an AMR, which I'm sure you will be able
24:20to see very soon.
24:21It's an autonomous mobile robot, helping us to move our materials and logistics.
24:28We're talking about an artificial intelligence driven application, which is used on our machines.
24:33And you saw one of the use cases recently in testing the performance and the quality
24:39of our breaker mechanism.
24:43And then we are using our 5G technologies for what we communicate data in the process.
24:49Right.
24:50Coming to the last question of this interaction, I just wanted to ask, like for Schneider India,
24:56what is the contribution that you make in terms of turnover to the entire Schneider
25:01group as such, you know, globally?
25:03And what is the kind of bear head that you are looking at from India perspective?
25:07Yeah, so India is an important contributor to the group.
25:12As I said earlier, we are the biggest size when it comes to employees, 38,000 almost
25:19employees in the country.
25:21We are one of the four hubs of the group.
25:24And in terms of top line, we are number three after US and China.
25:29So an important player.
25:31And I think all of us in India are very excited.
25:34How do we continue growing and become number two for the group in years to come?
25:39And recently, your global head had also spoken about India's total CAPEX plan, the three
25:47year CAPEX plan.
25:49So can you talk to us about what are the kind of investments that we have already made and
25:54where exactly they have gone and what's the remaining amount and where it will be spent?
25:58So we announced like 18 months ago that we're going to invest around 3,200 crores in India.
26:05And these 3,200 crores primarily goes for the expansion of our manufacturing footprint,
26:10but not only.
26:11As I said, we are also building our new offices in Bagamani, the biggest one for us.
26:18And out of all the expansions, they're almost in the pipe.
26:21So they're almost promised, which means cashed out or being promised in the system.
26:27And in the next almost a year, whatever we have promised will start coming into life
26:33and we'll start producing the products which we need in India for India and India for the
26:39global exports.
26:40It was a pleasure talking to you and I wish you all the best.
26:46Thank you Vikas for coming and thank you for the entire NDTV profit crew for coming
26:50and sharing this pleasure moment with us.