Many models, common platform

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: Even as the number of launches over the last five years in the domestic car market has grown to almost 50 a year, this onslaught has reduced product life-cycle from an avergae of 10-14 years to four to six years now. To keep pace with customer expectations, manufacturers have had to innovate continuously to attract new buyers into their fold.

What has helped them in this quest is sharing of car platforms across products and categories—a trend that is catching up fast in the Indian market. Already an established trend among car manufacturers around the world, platform sharing helps in two ways: one, it reduces cost by minimising design, engineering and product development costs—all of which form a substantial part of the overall costs. Two, it also helps car companies roll out newer products and upgrades as fast as eight to11 months as against a new car development timeframe of 36-42 months.

A recent example of this technique is the rolling out of the Zen Estilo from the common platform of the Maruti Alto and the Wagon R. “About 60% components, including engine, of the Wagon R and the newly launched Zen Estilo are common. Larger volume by commonisation provides economies of scale and hence reduce cost,” says Jagdish Khattar, managing director and CEO, Maruti Udyog Ltd (MUL). “If the engine of two cars is common, the car manufacturer saves a substantial chunk of money. The cost of the engine of a car such as the Wagon R is about Rs 60,000,” says K Kumar, advisor, engineering, MUL.

“Every automaker is reducing the number of platforms without reducing the number of models. By doing multiple units on the same platform we also reduce risk apart from reducing per unit cost,” points out Pawan Goenka, president (automotive sector), Mahindra and Mahindra.