'Tata group innovating affordable products for masses'

Thursday, 28 May 2009, 15:05 IST   |    1 Comments
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Bangalore: As part of its commitment to address the lower part of the pyramid, the 150,000-crore Tata group is innovating affordable products for the masses, its chairman Ratan Tata said here Wednesday. "We have taken a conscious decision to innovate products that are affordable for the masses, which account for about 70 percent of our population," Tata told students of the premier Indian Institute of Science (IISc) here. "Nano car, Nano housing and Ginger budget hotels from our group are some of the innovative products meant for the mass market." Interacting with the institute's faculty and students at the valedictory function of its centenary celebrations, Tata said as very few corporations addressed this section of society, the Tata group had taken the challenge of creating products that meet the aspirations of the masses. "All along, the focus of entrepreneurs and corporations has been to develop products for the top of the pyramid that has about 250-300 million people. Though these people constitute about 25-30 percent of the population, the need of the hour is to create products and services for the rest of the 1.2-billion Indians," he said. Expressing hope that similar innovations would come out of the century-old IISc, Tata said its faculty and students should strive to create new technologies and products that address the needs of the masses and improve quality of living. "Though we do not mandate what the faculty and research students should do, I am confident innovations will come out of the institute that will benefit the majority." Lamenting that very few organisations have taken the risk of developing new technologies for the masses, Tata said his group had created new opportunities and challenges through diversification and acquisitions. "We acquired Jaguar to have a global activity as we cannot have it here (India) on the basis of our volume or scale," he added.
Source: IANS