T&M services are at centerstage for Quality Assurance!

This particular writing is being done at the fag end of 2016 for an important reason.An important
Global telecom equipment procured for Indian operators is under severe threat of some unnecessary
delays and standoff due to new screening requirements of the telecom sector.The administration wants all imported telecom equipment must pass through local screening(for security against malware and the Equipment Quality) before it is inducted in the network.The telecom vendor community sees possibility of red tape and corruption due to expected delay in this process.

This issue has origin in the quality assurance of fast growing broadband network and hand held devices of modern generation,where local test labs and accreditation centers have not come up to
cater for this market.Also telecom engineering center and its associate Organisations regionally
are not equipped to tackle the additional load.They lack  both in terms of equipment of modern genre
as well as the trained staff for handling new age technologies and budget.Likewise the STQC organisation of Deity can't undertake testing of this nature on an All India basis.There are several testing requirements for assuring security(including cyber security) where Specialised digital testing
is required.

There are three interested parties involved in the process.Network Equipment Manufacturer,Telecon
Operators and System integrators- third party companies who install and test the equipment in and with the networks.System Integrators and Manufacturers share a plethora of complex relationships
and in many cases they roll into one entity as well.

We can safely conclude if we have team work between these three entities and the system integrators
companies we can achieve desired result fairly easily.The third party company should have skill set pertaining to T&M services and Cyber security as well.We will await comments from the telecom
community how feasible this arrangement will be,under present circumstances?

T&M services in particular can help Expand Make in India!

One of the flagship program in India is "Make in India" and the emphasis is high on local manufacturing of all kinds of hardware and in all kind of sectors: be it consumer,capital goods or
any high tech equipment.Because of several factors prevailing today like Mobile Devices and broadband penetration and Attendant fiberisation etc Handset Manufacturing with foreign collaboration is going on.Some 20-25 manufacturers of handsets have come to the country to take
advantage of big Telecom Market here.The mobile or terminal manufacturing is dominated by Chinese Companies and different business models are being adopted to suit their investment pattern
and Capex requirement.

India has few options here.The total manufacturing involves investment in Capital Equipment and Raw Materials and Components.High Tech manufacturing involves quite a bit of IP of processes,patents and other proprietary materials.Normally the packaging and testing of individual
components modules is very low value add activity in terms of percentage of selling price of the so
manufactured products.As per industry the percentage is from sub 1 percent to three percent.The rest goes to areas where we don't have over riding control.So local value creation is very limited.

T&M services can impact in a major way here.All the variety of these services can be employed here,so that both the nature of hardware and value can be increased.Cost envelope of total device can be done to high scale.Suppose the services and application software generation to manufacture and test mobile devices is increased,and simultaneously the better sourcing of local components,the overall indigenous component will increase.We should easily aim for a 10 times improvement on packaging and assembly and test services.

We look forward for more ideas and comments how to step up the local manufacturing program?
Please share your views and comment.Thank You.

Recognition of T&M Services as a strategic item in Defense Plan!

The present Government is putting lot of emphasis on the Indigeneous development and procurement of Defense Equipment and services from indigenous sources.As part of the revamping the Defense procurement policy is totally overhauled and provision of creating Strategic Partners is also made.Basically we need fundamental changes in the development and production of new and innovative technologies,as most of the incumbent here is our evolved Public sector companies and the DRDO labs expertise.

The participative collaboration with the industry will have to include sharing of plan re possible areas of supply where private sector can collaborate more smoothly and ensure their contribution to the quality of Defense wings operation and maintenance.The services are drawing up their individual Modernisation plans,and the T&M services are mentioned as a separate prominent line item,perhaps for the first time in their official plan document.For instance Air Force are mentioning "Test Equipment and Ground Support" as this to denote these services!

The plan document is under public discourse thru CII and therefore the arithmetics of procurement will be known progressively,but we can expect 2-5 percent of total outlay of hardware spent here.
This obviously will be good area for Indigeneous supply of software development and engineering services and procurement thereof.Operation and maintenance thru T&M technologies will be a low hanging fruit here.I believe lot will depend upon the T&M industry itself to assert for its own share by creative Assesment of need behind the need of T&M and offering right optimal mix of hardware and services.

Opportunity for approx 20,000 Cr for next 10 years is laid out by IAF.Now it is up to the industry to seize and execute by quality deliver You!

Global R&D resident in India is exotic growth avenue for T&M

As Indias overall economic recovery is happening slowly and steadily(while the Global pains are
still to get over), one thing remains sure footed. This is an unassailed positioning as a frugal destination for Global R&D.India as a market for tech products and a resource center for the rare as well as generic skills in development remains intact.Well the R&D work is many times concurrent,and the manpower engaged here is either trying to augment the work in Corporate Labs at home country,or supplements by a synchronicity of time.Sometimes even the products are getting developed locally both for Global Market,as well as Customised for value engineered largely meant for India.

We need to get deeper and understand where these engineers and scientists reside in Indian innovation centers,what cities are the major hosts to the highly qualified manpower,and most importantly what sectors of technology these people are working on!If we quickly make a reference to Study by Zinnov, we find that the major talent resides in Southern cities of Bangalore,Hyderabad and Chennai and followed by NCR cluster.Pune is fast catching up,as the Auto sector related work picks up around this cooler town.

Because of very amenable nature of software and design services type of work Semiconductor vertical is at the Top of Electronics oriented R&D,and closely followed by Defense and Aerospace
sector.Due to number of Personnels engaged in the Industry Auto vertical is highest. It is our speculation that Digital India, local Defense Manufacturing oriented towards Make in India will increase substantially the Defense and Aerospace man powers.Looks like MNC R&D persons are the best catchment area for the High cost ,High technology T&M services and hardware from the Industry both now and future.Clentele is sophisticated,business processes are driven by Global procurement processes and opportunities to do a good job of selling and supporting is high.

Can our T&M services and hardware industry systematically go after this specific cluster of clients which are expected to top 1 Million in numbers over 3-5 years? This could be linked to an opportunity where sometimes window can be narrow,but pay off very high,!

T&M growth should be explored in newer tech activity!

The growth of technology industry in India is expected to change gear in this year.And the main reason is that India has exited FY 16 on a reasonable positive note.The main cause is the excellent management of fiscal deficit at 3.9 percent of GDP and expected growth rate of 7.5 pct plus,The RBI is expected to be supportive of milder interest rate in the April first week announcement,and the various infrastructure projects,particularly the road sector is stepping up due to de logging of projects in the economy.Coal production this year has been record high level and power plants are not starved at all of the fuel.Restructuring of disco so thru UDAY and expected announcement of new UMPP will be a fillip to power sector.Steel sectors need of safeguard duty is also being finalized for combating steel demand slowing globally.Exports are on a slide for past one year,but the trade deficit is also
narrowed due to low imports and still low fuel prices.

But how is our technology industry is changing which will eventually trigger new projects and applications where the T&M and associated services can be deployed now on?We need to answer this possibility thru various bulk initiatives proposed by the Center.Top of them is deregulation and new DPP 2016 for Defense.Many new conglomerates and SMEs will become the strategic partners where the record high of 50 Billion Dollars worth projects are earmarked for Indigenisation.This coupled with Smart Cities project and Mobile manufacturing projects (some 100 of them) in various states will drive Capex and T&M demand.Green energy and Solar projects are another major T&M consumption.The national 4G where Jio is making major investment of Rs 150 000 cr will be triggering continuous buys of T&M.

M2M initiative is going to be important for new IoT type of work in telecom sector as well as others in the economy.So the sensor based T&M will be part of taxonomy in these projects.Emphasis is being placed on Cloud,Analytics and Big Data.Digital India across various public processes will also consume newer type T&M in bulk.Big public sectors also will be customers of power test equipment and system components.The Dept of Space allocation is continuously on the rise and so also of Railways projects of infrastructure and required monitoring equipments at several places.DEFENSE LABORATORIES are the main source of technology in strategic pursuits and T&M will be specially
important here.Indigeneous navigational satellites will spur lot of monitoring and test equipment.We hope that the FY 17 will be very positive for the industry as these new projects are funded by the center. Best of Luck.

Design and Manufacturing in Strategic Areas can help Industry!

We identified last year that the two major areas of improvement are required if we need the tech industry in Defense to grow rapidly: namely the Rapid Prototyping and practicing T&M skills and
their execution in practical field.With last one year of great introspection and analysis, a total review of Defense induction and procurement has been done.Many aspects of procurements are identified for possible indigenous production and under Make in India program the execution of the procurement policy is to be do Everything!

We are not sure if the figures thrown out in the media are really feasible or the projections are authentic,but it seems some 50 to 60 Billion Dollars worth projects can be indegenised.A wise and pragmatic use of this big pie will be encouraging critical technology holders to get interested in India and local manufacturing created.Transparency and supportive environment thru IPR protection,tax laws,stable and steady orders flow and liberal FDI and FPI are many things to be ensured.Also we need to see that a parity is maintained between investing domestic and Global groups,so that we project Indias open and fair business practices.

Another trend in critical technologies Globally is that lot of veteran small design and technology companies and consulting houses are available at fairly moderate valuations.India industry can make innovative policy of co opting them thru M&A or other forms of collaborative pursuits to get best technology.Likewise the Rapid prototyping work can be concurrently undertaken abroad and in India.
All this work ,if integrated and homogenized can lead to a good indigeneous manufacturing base.Since Indias strengths are in software and services related skills,Design and prototyping can be leveraged efficiently.

Another innovative idea could be to get the services of many retired experts out of Senior Management teams of former DRDO scientists and Production Managers from BEL and HAL.They can be a resource pool for effective translation of know how from these Global companies into hardware or software in equipment.Similar expertise also exists today in many small private SME companies for augmentation.Let us see that all parameters fall in place and we have both strategy and execution in place!

Hopeful involvement for Defense Offset for T&M

A small note for mentioning the big Defense offsets is in order.As more and more regular systems get finalized for readymade projects in Defense happens,higher level of offsets get accrued for the contractors,the possibility of services including T&M shoots up.A figure around offsets of 10 B$ etc
is mentioned at this time.

Naturally these figures will increase a lot when the DPP 2016 is announced and procurement under local production and from MSME is undertaken.Both these activities will trigger the increase of T&M content in offset procured thru local vendors. Our estimates creates a figure of around 5 pct of the Total offset is envisaged.

The Government is still to classify the offset percentage related to T&M and therefore due caution is needed so our estimates on T&M don't go overboard.Right now we need to contend with five percent as good approximation.

More we will cover in next months blogs when we hear some major contracts finalized.

T&M Services can drive the overall Engineering Services Companies sharper!

Globally the technology sector is being monitored for its all pervasiveness.The tech sector is usually
perceived as the IT industry and its hardware,software services and peripherals to the core computing
platforms.Therefore the Engineering component of technology sector is counted as the IT.There is no
harm in doing that as Engineering Services are technological in nature and if simplicity is to be maintained in drawing the numbers,it makes sense to do that way.However the outsourcing of Enterprise and its relevance to countries like India,there is a case to look closely IT services exports and Business Process Management Exports.Industry circles feel that Engineering Services Export may turn out to be the outlier within various segments under IT sector.

The Engineering Services sector is itself quite broad.And various engineering services like Application Development, and Maintenance types are getting commodities and priced very genetically in the market place.The IT industry defines and names Mechanical,Embedded,Product Life Cycle Management and Software product as the sub segments.Now our submission is to look
the T&M industry as the specialized T&M services (software,application development etc) as part of
Engineering Services.T&M calibration services,metrology and synchronization will also be its part.

If T&M services become officially part of the Engineering Services spectrum,the higher growth attributed to it will really shine distinctly and it will benefit the T&M industry immensely.This highlighting of T&M services as part of Engineering Services Export was done in this blog,few years
back too.May be the time for this idea has now come,with the arrival of several 1Billion Dollar Engg
services business breaking out as the service companies.

There is time to rethink and reboot T&M services from this angle.

Framework for startup CEO for new age T&M systems company,!

Recently over the last few weeks I happened to meet and mentor range of startup CEOs in the
Tech industry.These new age CEOs are themselves tech savvy,young and very qualified at the
Ivy League schools.Naturally they are ambitious and want to grow rapidly like any other services
company to become "Unicorns".At times my understanding of their business model was poor(due
to lack of my own awareness) or sheer incomprehension of market place where they are wishing
to operate/operating.

As I thought thru and reflected on my awareness and the B2B operating environment of selling
I was approaching a framework roughly these companies could adopt.My basic parameters to work
was the following:

B2B nature of Selling
High technology,software,services and 3rd party jigs,fixtures and miscellany
Market Govt,PSU and Corporate plus International
Sales Cycle  Medium to Long (After design win can go mainstream in small volume)
Capex intensive but rationalization for balancing opex
Decision Making Unit.   Usually involves Head, CFO Ctry Operations or support manager
Both PreSales and PostSales support needed to sustain interest in Vendor
Funnel Picking selectively rather than Funnel Percolation
Excellent Commercial understanding required, Bidding Process thoroughness
Accounts Recievable processes in Govt,Corporate and International Areas
CRM Analytics, Big Data application understanding
New Age technology and Norms
VC funding sources including Crowdfunding


Looking from the probable owner or the CEO viewpoint,who manages this startup, I guesstimated
a Test Automation and Integration service co will very much approximate to what we have listed
out here.The head of these type of companies usually wear many hats and crowded web browser
is there on the desk.

Following list of tools and softwares for his day to day work will be handy

Collaboration Tool.          Stack

CRM.                                Sales force or Zoho

GitHub.                               Track the techies work

Analytics dashboard.             Hub spot

Some other tools for specific project management may be required,but above is very much covering
the good extent.I feel such IT infrastructure will be good for a T&M solutions Company CEO.

Let me know your comments and queries.

Digital Enterprises of today are T&M groundswell !

Modern Management Gurus are increasingly positioning the new age enterprises for A fast Digitalisation and analytics will be the characteristics of these Organisations.They are more likely
to use the power of so called Design Thinking,AI and vast deployment of Sensors of all kind.So the
T&M technologies and services will be used in these applications in novel ways!

Leadership will be using the power of Algorithms and sensors in combo.Sensors will be part of the Process of IoT connections and M2M interfaces.These markets of connections will be big.Industry
experts expect the markets to be in several Trillions Dollar opportunities.Obviously these will be based on many elements talking to each other and phases of Design,Deployment and Maintenance
aspects of these networks will need lot of portable T&M and systems.

The new age enterprises will try to give customers the end to end experience.Ultimately the parameters of cost,convenience and systemic process will be monitored by the Marketeers.To deliver
good experience of systems all measurement,monitoring etc will be handled by T&M technologies
General and Customised.Here again lot of refining of standard as well as Customised T&M systems
will be deployed.

As life and Organisations become project based,the T&M deployed will also transformed.Exciting
Times will dawn when the likes of Smart Cities and Smart Villages will come.Generation of new ideas for these entities will trigger new kind of T&M as well.

T&M contribution through Services in Offset and Call Drop nuisance!

A very positive move has been spearheaded by the Defense Minister by announcing the Services and Skills inclusion in the mandatory 30 percent part to be locally generated,as part of Procurement contracts now onwards.The minister is very pragmatic in the sense that the content of offset can't be summarily discussed as a ploy to window dress for any illegal,or unethical practice.Offset can and should include lot of incremental business to the local Indian companies,where the efficient and effective use of overseas hardware can happen through these services.

The local content of software,engineering services,third party hardware of jigs,fixtures and training on technology delivered through local Personnels can be very useful for the upkeep and serviceability
of Defence Systems.Incidentally this will have to necessarily include lot of T&M hardware,Services,skills of high technology and project management.This can all accrue to small scale,technopreneur driven local T&M companies.Most of them are highly accomplished people in their field and they can contribute immensely to the overall mission of "Make in India" objectives.
The Govt and Industry should do close collaboration and help Indigenisation in this program.

I am a little disappointed to see there is still lack of industry commitment on solving the call drop issue.The Government is wanting operators to improve infrastructure and use of better processes through available spectrum sharing and trading etc.But a vital and critical aspect is totally ignored
and that part is taking the help of Professional T&M service companies and solving through QoS
angle.Lets all remember the good quality telecom infrastructure includes the appropriate T&M equipment,services and automation.That will ensure proper pro-active quality gaps and how to resolve by better network roll outs.A side advantage will be increased revenues to the test industry,and it's critical role in resolving this nagging issue!

2016 will be Indias disruption technology year and augurs well for T&M

The year2016 in India will see several technology disruptions the way it is deployed in services,make in India programs,smart cities development,Hitech manufacturing and public delivery of services.It will also see India take some heavy investments coming to fruition as far as Strategic key infrastructure projects undertaken since the new Government at the center came into being in Mid
2014.Hopefully and more confidently,the initiatives and investments will result in better productive
numbers for GDP growth too.As more and more public initiatives and policy narratives yield results,the background contribution of T&M technologies will be appreciated,and there will be encouragement to use More T&M tools and systems in latter half of run up to 2021.

Major 2016 visibility remains for manufacturing Smartphones,Smart Cities development,4G deployment throughout India,Digital India driving public services and exploitation of Aadhar based data services for general common man.Railways will see rollout of 400 stations on Wifi network and bigger players taking lead in 4G across India.One million mobile users with sizable smartphone percentage will be another catalyst to new age eServices through the Smart Networks.Likewise the
Startup culture in our major IT centers will see growth as well as shakeout,and so IoT Cloud etc will
be subjected to newer stress testing and test automation.Networks will be created throughout 2016 for
health,education and Auto connectivity and effective Rail communication.

Also India will be more than halfway to have a GPS system of its own,and seven satellites required for the project completion will be through in 2016.Shared services like taxi sharing and other social
Apps based things will be commonplace here.This will give encouragement to small entrepreneurs and also trigger need to do LAN and WAN optimization and testing.Most of the Smartphone will be
carrying useful apps,so the network upkeep and regulations conformity will be needed.

This is expected to be the year of disruptive technologies and rollout of networks in Education,Health,Communication,Defense and Space sectors and which will further need new tools and T&M technologies as the background support.Hopefully we will also see better figures for T&M tools and platforms in the business stat also.Happy tech year 2016.....