Forging ahead

EDITORIAL

Acknowledgment always feels good. We are extremely pleased with reader responses that are flowing in our way. We are inundated with queries, requests for extra copies, and most importantly, success stories of our readers.

In fact, this time we have recorded one such occasion of P.P Jewellers, which has recently been conferred the Niryat Shree Award by Kamal Nath, Union Minister of Commerce & Industries.

Also, we have sought to answer a query from another reader about how he should protect his office from data theft? Our SME-IT section seeks to tackle the query. It was handled, in part, in the January issue, but this time we present a more comprehensive checklist.

Moving on to our cover story, we focus on the auto components sector that has become a torch bearer of sorts. And even as the industry jostles for better tax structures and fights rising raw material costs that continue to bog its fortunes down in the global arena, there are survivors who have managed to fight the odds.

Primarily through the enthusiastic acceptance of a wide array of man agement practices such as Kaizen and Six Sigma among others. Significantly, many players down south are well on to their way to bagging top honours such as the Deming Award.

Tamil Nadu in particular deserves special mention for the kind of contribution it's making in the auto components sector. With over 100 key players in the world's automobile industry located in Chennai, Tamil Nadu holds 35 per cent of auto components installed capacity.

It accounts for about $240 million worth exports that represents 27.5 per cent of India's total exports. The auto component industry of the state has witnessed an investment of about $800 million in recent years. In fact, its recorded a similar growth as the much hyped IT industry in the state.

Our cover story focuses on the clusters in the south and the support they provide to auto component companies. There are the views of players such as C Sivakumar, promoter & CEO, Prabha Engineers, who is looking to achieve over 100 per cent growth. We also have the views of Sanjay Jayavarthanavelu, chairman, CII "� Tamil Nadu and ACMA's southern region chairman, V Ramachandran, who talks about the need for a level playing field.

In fact, different people address the issue of how margins are under pressure and how players need to value-add, establish brands and rapidly change to meet the needs. We have a special focus on how these can be sorted and the view of Sachin Khandelwal, GM, ICICI Bank.

To round it off, we have our regular columns and 'Trade Zone,' in particular, discusses why there is reason to believe that the recent bilateral agreement between India and ASEAN negotiators may not provide auto components sector enough margin to maneuver.

Finally, just before the Budget, we also pick up on the ongoing debate about why is the selective approach in service tax better than the comprehensive approach.

We hope you will find all the information useful and urge you to keep sending us your feedback at emergingenterprise.feedback@business-standard.com.