The facility today houses over 1200 employees across all teams.
7. Panasonic
Panasonic has established its first R&D subsidiary in India, the Panasonic Research & Development Center India (PRDCI), in Gurgaon, Haryana. The centre will contribute to the company’s business expansion in the growing market with efficient R&D tailored to local needs. Panasonic has been making a company-wide effort to cultivate its business in India, having enhanced its product lineup and marketing structure here.
The PRDCI, Panasonic’s ninth R&D centre in emerging countries, will help realise an integrated operation of product development, manufacturing and sales with its effective, locally-oriented R&D initiatives. In particular, serving as a technology platform, the centre will promote the technologies and their standardisation that are deemed essential for making inroads into the Indian market through collaboration with local universities and industrial partners, mainly in the areas of energy management and audio-video products as well as new business development.
Panasonic aims to become the No.1 green innovation company in the electronics industry by 2018—the 100th anniversary of its founding. To this end, the company is undergoing a transformation to be a globally-oriented company, focusing on emerging markets such as India, under its Green Transformation 2012 (GT12) management plan covering three years through March 2013.
8. Philips Lighting India
In 2008, Philips inaugurated a global R&D centre for lighting in India. This was its third such unit in the world. The facility, situated in Noida, not only caters to the needs of the Indian market but also the Asia-Pacific, European and North American markets. Philips’ other R&D centres are located at Eindhoven in the Netherlands and in Shanghai, China.
One of the primary research areas for the India centre is to develop products that can tackle high-voltage fluctuations in India. In 2010, the lighting business contributed 57.9 per cent to Philips India’s overall revenue. The main focus of this R&D facility is provide lighting solutions that are customised keeping in mind the India-specific environmental and infrastructural challenges such as voltage fluctuations, energy spikes and intermittent power supply.
“Philips recently developed India’s first consumer LED bulb. This bulb is a significant R&D achievement which was designed at its Noida research facility. Within Philips, it is the fastest innovation globally—from conceptualisation till the actual production,” informs Indranil Goswami, head-Lighting Application Services, Philips Lighting India.
9. Samsung Electronics
Samsung has two software development centres—Samsung India Software Centre (SISC) and Samsung India Software operations unit (SISO) at Noida and Bengaluru, respectively. While the Samsung India Software Centre is developing software solutions for Samsung’s global software requirements for high-end televisions like plasma and LCD TVs and digital media products, SISO is working on major projects for Samsung Electronics in the areas of telecom (wireless terminals and infrastructure), networking, system-on-chip (SoC), digital printing and other multimedia/digital media as well as application software. In addition to working on global R&D projects, SISO is also helping Samsung India’s mobile business by focusing on product customisation for the Indian market. Samsung India currently employs around 2000 employees across its R&D centres at Noida and Bengaluru.
Samsung India is also carrying out hardware R&D at its Noida R&D centre. The focus of the R&D centre is to customise consumer electronics products (flat TVs with Easy View technology) to better meet the needs of Indian consumers.
10. Texas Instruments
In August 1985, Texas Instruments (TI) set up an R&D facility in Bengaluru, becoming the first global technology company to establish its presence in India. Ever since, India has been a great resource for TI for talent, leadership and innovation.
The focus at TI India has consistently been on innovation. The number of patents filed in the US by TI engineers in India is perhaps the highest by any technology company in the country.
TI India has achieved many ‘firsts.’ In 1995, it developed the first processor designed in India for control applications. The TI India R&D centre was extensively involved in developing LoCosto—the industry’s first single-chip solution for wireless handsets.
TI India is deeply involved in developing state-of-the-art solutions for applications like wireless handsets, wireless infrastructure (base stations), video (security and surveillance, IP phones, set-top boxes) and high-performance analogue. Today, there is hardly any chip produced by TI that is not touched by engineers at TI India.
Since 2006, in addition to being a significant and critical R&D centre for TI globally, TI India has increased its focus on the Indian semiconductor market in a big way. The company is working closely with its customers in India in a wide array of sectors such as industrial electronics (UPS, inverters, energy meters, lighting, etc), medical electronics (ultrasound scanners, X-ray machines, ECG machines, MRI scanners, etc), consumer, telecom and automotive.
[/stextbox]
The author is an executive editor at EFY
