TCS, Tata Elxsi to work on Panasonic products in India

Japanese consumer electronics firm to invest Rs 240 cr over five years

Japanese consumer electronics major Panasonic has engaged with information technology (IT) and engineering service providers- Tata Consultancy Services and Tata Elxsi- to develop smart solutions and products for its customers in India and other neighbouring countries.

The company has identified India as its third major research and development centre after Japan and the US. Company earned a revenue of around Rs 9,600 crore from the Indian market last year and the country accounts for 2 per cent of the overall turnover of Panasonic Corporations.

Panasonic will invest Rs 240 crore over a time period of five years for new developments in areas such as connected home appliances, mobility, energy, storage solution and security. "This investment will be approximately 10 per cent of our revenue expectations from new businesses in India, South Asia, Middle East and Africa," said Manish Sharma, president and chief executive officer, Panasonic India and South Asia.

As part of its research and development (R&D) activities in the country, the company has set up two overseas development centres in Bengaluru.

While the second overseas development centre is set up at a TCS office in Bengaluru with an employee strength of 60 software engineers, another centre was set up about a month ago at the Tata Elxsi campus.

The company termed the facility at TCS as the first innovation hub from India that would work on solutions for connected community, mobility, energy and industrial internet of things (IoT).

TCS is going to bring in its industry knowledge and global innovation practices in order to create an eco-system for Panasonic to shape the future of product strategy, said the company.

"It is important to be close to where the technology development happens. Last month, we opened another offshore development centre at the Tata Elxsi campus and today, we opened an innovation centre at the TCS office. This initiative is pretty deep-rooted. The centre at Tata Elxsi, which is meant only for appliances, will look at development of Artificial intelligence and IoT solutions," said Sharma.

Sharma also expects India to contribute nearly 4 per cent of Panasonic's overall revenue by 2019.

He added that these facilities would be formed through a collaborative model where these service providers would work on the technology and Panasonic would make the investment.

Panasonic is recruiting software engineers for the innovation hub at TCS campus and expects to hire 100 people over a period next few years. "We will hire mainly from the top institutes (such as IITs)," added Sharma.