Wipro Lighting and Furniture Business, part of the Wipro Consumer Care and Lighting Group, is betting big on the office, retail, infrastructure and green buildings market in India by roping in international designers, besides hiring more from premier designs schools in the country.
“We are hiring from design schools like the National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad, IIT Powai’s industrial design centre as well as IISC Bangalore to give a major boost to our innovation efforts,” Parag Kulkarni vice-president and business head (commercial lighting and furniture business) Wipro Consumer Care and Lighting, told mediapersons here on Wednesday.
Kulkarni said the division had already engaged international designers like Claudio Bellini from Milan, Tim Wallace from London and Michel Tortel of Paris to design the company’s latest range of offerings.
“At present, we have around six exclusive experience centres across Bangalore, Chennai, Aurangabad and Pune. We are set to add such centres centres in Mumbai, Delhi and Hyderabad shortly,” he said, while declining to comment further.
Wipro today launched its 10th edition of Light & Furniture Show, as part of its campaign to showcase its new products in the furniture and lighting segments. The company also used the occasion to launch its premium range of indoor and outdoor LED-based lighting range, designer urban lighting range and modular furniture.
On display at the show were the Vola range of products designed by Paris-based designer Michel Tortel and Transit range of chairs designed by Conrad Marini of Toronto. The urban architectural Vola streetlight and floodlight range has been designed to suit the changing Indian urban landscape.
“We have been focusing on lighting systems for green buildings. Today, of the 130 green buildings in India, we have done the entire lighting solutions for 75, accounting for a market share of about 60 per cent. With our LED based lighting products, we will be sharpening focus on green buildings,” Kulkarni said, adding that a majority of their 1,000-odd LED lighting products were compatible with solar-based lighting systems.
The lighting and furniture business, which grew 15 per cent in the first quarter of the current fiscal, contributed nearly 11 per cent to Wipro Consumer Care and Lighting’s Rs 755-crore revenues for the first quarter.