Tata Tech arm on the prowl for foreign buys

In its bid to strenghthen global delivery model in the Asian region, Tata Technologies US arm INCAT plans acquisitions in Japan, Korea, Thailand and China. It also plans to acquire small domestic firms.

The acquisition will be in the areas of product design, engineering and product lifecycle management. Tata Technologies had acquired INCAT through its subsidiary Tata Technologies Inc, USA.

INCAT is world's leading independent provider of PLM services to automotive, aerospace and durable goods manufacturers.

"The company is also looking at Japan, Korea, China and Asean countries. We are also considering inorganic growth to make land presence in these countries," said Samir Yajnik, chief operating officer, INCAT.

He said the company is looking at strategic niche areas and land presence to leverage offshore capabilities of engineering automation services with the high-end onshore strengths to offer a strong and seamless onshore and offshore delivery capability to the international customers in the automotive, aerospace and engineering industries.

"INCAT is looking at specific customer related projects in Korea for engineering, PLM, automation and ERP. The company targets to double its turnover to $500 million by 2010. At present, the turnover of the company is over $200 millon,"said Yajnik.

INCAT is focussing on onsite and offshore projects for North America and European market, assignments for MNCs want to set up presence in Asian market and domestic companies.

Yajnik said, "INCAT is also planning to set up sales and marketing offices at Chennai, Ahmedabad and Kolkata apart from increasing headcount in Pune and Bangalore."

INCAT's India delivery center is located at the Center for Advanced Engineering & Design in Pune.Including India, INCAT has more than 3,000 employees in 45 cities in 12 countries, serving over 2,000 client organizations that include 10 of the top 10 automotive OEMs and 5 of the top 5 aerospace OEMs.