Manufacturing Muscle for India
The Christian Science Monitor has a good article on India's growing manufacturing economy.http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/1101/p01s03-wosc.html
...."We have experienced trial and error," says Heung Soo Lheem, managing director of Hyundai's India operations.
For example, he sees a large number of malnourished workers, meaning that they are weaker than workers in other plants. Moreover, there are unusually high absentee rates, and not just due to illness. "People will travel two or three days by train to go to a marriage," says Mr. Lheem.
Yet the bottom line is good: "The efficiency is not as good as in Korea, but it still has competitiveness," says Lheem, noting India's lower wages. "Our Indian operation is very much successful at this point."
Then he adds pointedly: "Even more so than our Chinese operations."
Indeed, the factory at Sriperumbudur is a plot of perfect Korean efficiency transplanted to the scrub of the south Indian plains - right down to the kimchi in the executive cafeteria. The factory's 9,000 employees, contractors, and apprentices split three eight-hour shifts - the only plant in Hyundai's worldwide network to be online 24 hours a day. In addition, the workers handle different car models on the same assembly line, shifting seamlessly between Santros, Sonatas, and the other four models Hyundai makes here.....
...."With 1 billion people to feed, you cannot depend on services," says Sugato Sen, director of the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers in New Delhi.....
posted by Aditya @ 11/01/2006 02:21:00 PM
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