Ashley Design is now Defiance Technologies

Ashley Design and Engineering Services, a division of heavy vehicle manufacturer and Hinduja Group’s flagship company Ashok Leyland has been renamed ‘Defiance Technologies’.

The renamed company will adopt a go-to-market strategy by partnering Detroit-based automotive testing firm Defiance Testing & Engineering, which was acquired by Ashok Leyland in 2007.

V Sumantran, executive vice-chairman of Hinduja Automotive, said the ultimate plan was to merge the Indian and US divisions into a single entity and give it a separate legal identity.

Defiance Technologies is also in the process of setting up a physical testing centre in Chennai on the lines of Tata Motors’ Engineering Research Centre (ERC) in Pune. While the ERC is dedicated to Tata Motors’ engineering services needs, Defiance Technologies’ scope will address a wider market and capabilities apart from the automotive space like aerospace, off-highway and construction equipment.

 

The group executives, however, said the new testing lab was still under discussion and details of investment and land spread had not yet been frozen. “We are looking at land both in north and south Chennai. We are yet to finalise the details,” Sumantran said.

Defiance Technologies currently offers virtual engineering services such as basic design to high-end predictive analysis sought by automotive and aerospace customers for their collaborative product development environment.

“As we look to the future, Hinduja Automotive and Ashok Leyland are fine-tuning their strategy to build on a range of critical technologies and competencies. With these, we will target selective global business opportunities where we believe our synergy will endow us with a unique advantage,” Sumantran added.

The combined Defiance operations now has a team of 300 professionals with core skills in product design, validation product and process engineering for automotive and other industrial products and systems.