Tech Mahindra to launch connected solutions for used cars

The company is learnt to have entered into a strategic alliance with Germany's Enquiss GmbH for the same

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Tech Mahindra, India’s fifth-largest information technology services company, is learnt to have entered into a strategic alliance with a German start-up, Enquiss GmbH & Co KG, to expand in the connected devices segment.

As part of the agreement, Tech Mahindra and Enquiss GmbH are developing solutions using the latter’s intellectual property and platform to address the automotive segment.

Tech Mahindra said its engagement with the German company wasn’t an acquisition. “This is a very small IP and framework, which will help us differentiate and accelerate our access to the market,” Karthikeyan Natarajan, senior vice-president and head of integrated engineering at Tech Mahindra, told Business Standard. “This is something we have built jointly and it will be priced appropriately to customers.”

Founded in 2010, Enquiss GmbH & Co KG operates in the field of business and technology consulting, according to the company’s LinkedIn profile. The Göttingen-headquartered company focuses on the automotive and manufacturing sectors.

In the recent past, Tech Mahindra has been aggressive in its inorganic growth pursuits. In November this year, it had signed a definite agreement to acquire US-based Lightbridge Communications Corporation for an enterprise valuation of $240 million.

Since its acquisition of Satyam in 2009, Tech Mahindra has acquired at least six companies; it has also carried out a merger (with Mahindra Engineering Services). The company’s management believes acquisitions will enable Tech Mahindra to record revenue of $5 billion by the end of FY15. The automotive solutions the company is launching along with Enquiss GmbH will be targeted at the aftermarket segment. The company says through its solutions, cars can intelligently communicate their conditions through Telematics devices, with back-end cloud connectivity.

Telematics devices, connected with cars’ CAN (controller area network) interface, will transmit information about the usage and issues involving vehicles. CAN, a communication protocol, communicates with multiple electronic control units in a car.

“We are confident we will be able to provide the services to any car that is produced from 2000 and have CAN connectivity,” said Natarajan.
 

Automotive has been a flagship sub-vertical in Tech Mahindra’s Manufacturing vertical with 2 decades of experience powered by  more than 10,000  associates.