GE puts India on centre stage

To make the most of cost-effective engineering skills in the sub-continent

GE has drawn up plans to make India a global sourcing hub for all its core businesses. It has decided to develop and manufacture products locally for global markets and partner in large-scale projects in areas such as energy, water, aviation and rail transport.

"Manufacturing will be a big focus for us in India," GE India President and CEO Tejpreet Singh Chopra said, adding, "We want to utilise our global scale, processes and technologies to take advantage of the cost-competitive engineering skills in India."

Giving an example of products developed in India, which can be taken to mature markets, Chopra said that GE's John F Welch Technology Centre in Bangalore had developed a mobile electro-cardiogram, which costs a fraction of what existing machines cost.

"We can even sell it for use at home in the US," said Chopra, adding, "We solve unique problems here as over 300 million people live at less than $1 a day. The innovation coming out of this country in terms of technology as well as business models can help us in whatever we do."

GE has five manufacturing facilities in the country and employs 4,500 scientists at its Bangalore centre.

Chopra took over the reins of GE in India some months ago from Scott Bayman, who had set up GE's business in the country from scratch in the 1990s.

GE India hopes to close the current year with a turnover of $2.8 billion and, according to Chopra, is on course to achieve the target of $8 billion by 2010. The company has sold its plastics business worldwide to Sabic.

Chopra said GE would also expand its media (NBC Universal) and enterprise solutions (security, sensing, etc) businesses in the country in the days to come, though these would be smaller than its three main lines of business "" infrastructure, healthcare and services.