point

March - 2015 - issue > CXO View Point

It's time for ISMAC

Venkatesh Natarajan, VP-IT, Ashok Leyland
Thursday, February 26, 2015
Venkatesh Natarajan, VP-IT, Ashok Leyland
Ashok Leyland (NSE: ASHOKLEY; BSE: 500477) is an automobile manufacturing company based out of Chennai. The company has a current market cap of Rs. 173.88 billion.

Information Technology evolution has brought in a slew of demand for IT and IT enabled devices and services in different verticals of business, while encouraging innovations across all sectors. With the changing business eco-system, it becomes imperative for any organization to adapt the new technological innovations and platforms, to be the front runner & enhance its services sophisticatedly to meet the demands of clientele. A right investment into right technology is crucial to overcome the obsolescence of technology in today's hypercompetitive market enriched with tech-savvy customers. Considering IT as a business partner rather than just business enabler, organizations must pioneer new approach towards market. A host of IT platforms available in the market today facilitate everything, be it developing business applications like ERP & CRM or manufacturing execution systems.

Technology & Business in Welded Relationship

The dependence on IT is greater today. The day is not so far when IT and business will get merged into a welded relationship. Google's research on driverless car is the exhibit A that showcases the significant expansion of IT foot print in automotive industry. In future, technology will play a significant role in enabling organizations to build an automated office and assisting with compliance to statuary requirements by tracking and monitoring vehicle abuse. The advent of new technologies like infotronics and telematics are enforcing customers to take their vehicles to respective dealer workshops for repair or maintenance instead of road side workshops, since these technical components require a high-level skill set.

Leveraging connected vehicle module and the associated data captured using sensors, the business model can be transformed including establishment of various Annual Maintenance Contract (AMC) with customers, deriving insights into warranty expenditure, and virtual test driving experience. Today, technology covers every facet of our business operations including manufacturing, IT, supporting, marketing, finance and Human Resource.


Share on Twitter
Share on LinkedIn
Share on facebook