OEMs are facing new challenges to improve the existing technologies and develop next-generation ones for the new mobility in shorter times. Reducing market responding time along with new complexities are paving the way for virtual simulation, which displaces physical tests and prototypes by virtually replicating product development, testing and manufacturing with simulations. Emmanuel Leroy, Executive Vice-President Industry Solutions at ESI Group, explains, “We enable our customers to drastically reduce every additional physical prototype by using our solutions. In the end, only one physical prototype is required to validate the whole concept. We envision that one day we may be able to virtually certify a product from end to end.” Excerpts:

Q) How did the Covid impact the software and services businesses of ESI Group?

The Covid pandemic has accelerated the need for more digitalisation within the industrial market. It has also somehow accelerated the readiness level of our customers and made solutions such as virtual prototyping even more relevant. Indeed, we enabled the continuity of our clients’ business. The use of virtual prototyping allowed them to continue designing, testing and prototyping their products. Our human-centric approach – one of ESI Group’s four outcome solutions – was particularly used by our customers to ensure the continuity of their businesses: using virtual reality to experience the product from home.

During pandemic times, we also provided our CFD (computational fluid dynamic) solutions to help investigating different scenarios to demonstrate the effect of occupant proximity, ventilation systems and contamination avoidance unique to each office and plant environment. ESI Group developed different virtual scenario, based on its facilities in India, to optimise the return to offices and on plant – especially on a car assembly line.

How the growing complexity of part process is influencing the virtual testing?

We notice that the automotive industry is facing more and more draconian regulations, disruptive technologies, intensifying competitions and shortening response time. Coupled with these, customers are getting more demanding on quality, reliability, safety and production deadlines in the business. Indeed, end users are no longer looking for products but for results (flight hours instead of engines, number of possible kilometres instead of electric car, etc.) and they seek for committed and responsible automakers to motivate their buys. At ESI Group, we have understood these preoccupations and we have defined four primary solutions answering our customers’ expectations.

The first one is the Pre-certification and Validation, enabling gains in performance and productivity. The purpose is double: meeting certification and validation requirements like crash, safety and fatigue issues in the first attempt and then increasing productivity with predictive models and process automation.

The second outcome is Smart Manufacturing, which enables to establish the right manufacturing processes to meet the performance indicators for industrial products and processes.

The Human-Centric Product and Process Validation, our third outcome, focuses on humans by implementing an operator-centric approach to ensure the efficiency of assembly, maintenance operation and the safety of human interactions.

The last one, Pre-experience, is the most advanced solution of ESI Group. Here, our customers and the operators do not look at the product itself, but virtually experience a product, component, subsystem or system under numerous conditions and environments.

Using these approaches, we identify industry challenges from the customer’s perspective and support them in achieving their results.

Finally, as products are getting more complex, one of our strengths is our end-to-end multi-material assembly solution with modelling of different materials (steel, aluminum, composite) and manufacturing processes, covering all the product development cycle.

What will be the growth drivers for the internal combustion engine-driven vehicles business?

Safety is essential and will remain a key driver in the future. Today, the active safety is gaining traction owing to the regulations and overall trends. There is an increasing demand for smart integrated safety, which caters to both active and passive what?

Alongside there are regulations on Co2. In Europe, the Worldwide Harmonised Light Vehicle Test Procedure (WLTP) Norm is challenging and will eventually be implemented in other countries. Regarding Co2 reduction, we focus part of our research and innovation around engine efficiency, aerodynamics and light-weighting, as we did with Bentley for instance.

OEMs are also looking to reduce the manufacturing cost and development time which are leading demand for virtual prototyping, digital twin and shifting OEMs’ investment from hardware to software. The end-to-end value and the digital continuity from the early design to the production is essential to achieve these goals.

OEMs are exploring possibilities to manufacture ICE vehicles and EVs on the same line. Being a solution provider for the smart manufacturing process, how do you see this as a challenge?

Some OEMs assemble EV and ICE vehicles on the same line and look for flexibility, while others use completely dissociated platforms. We, consequently, must find the right strategy regarding their requirements. The new upcoming challenges in CASE mobility manufacturing will bring even more complexities from components to manufacturing. We have to consider the complexity to train the operators: our virtual reality solutions are key here. We help our customers by providing training, on both ICE vehicles and EVs manufacturing processes to their team, even from different place around the world, gathered on the same interface. This solution gathers all stakeholders (from operators to QHSE officers and plant managers) around the same product. This immersive tool helps getting complementary feedbacks early on in the process.

Where do you find more competencies or comfortability — in the complete vehicle design or component design?

Clearly, we are positioning ourselves on the whole vehicle design as it gives the most significant benefit for the OEM and other customers. We are talking about an end-to-end value that we can demonstrate on full scale CAE demonstrators. When it comes to a standalone component, the complex interactions between components and environment are not well taken into account and can lead to reduced predictiveness. In this case, we come up with a holistic view of the problem itself. It is how we defined the four outcome solutions introduced earlier.

Do you think that virtual prototypes will, at a 100 percent, completely replace physical ones ?

Virtual prototypes are step by step replacing physical prototypes. Nevertheless, I think physical prototypes remain today essential to certify the product at the very end of the development phase. To give an example, in 2019 Renault succeeded a 5-star rating of its Clio 5 on the Euro NCAP safety certification test with a single physical prototype, the one needed for the consumer test. Virtual certification is a topic discussed within the automotive ecosystem, allowing to solely relying on the simulation from end to end. But we are not at that point right now.

Which is your largest market for automotive business?

The automotive industry is the most significant contributor to our total revenues. Today, Japan is the largest market for our automotive business. However, India has been an important market for ESI, and it has been growing quite well over the years.

Most of our engineering developments teams, for both our software and our platforms, are based in India.

What are the challenges in the business?

The increasing complexity I mentioned before is definitely a challenge, but it also brings opportunities to us. Our end-to-end multi-material, multiprocess solutions and chaining capabilities are key to overcome the challenges of the automobile market. Due to the ever growing content of electronics, system simulations and systems of systems techniques are improving as well. Our focus is to strengthen our collaboration with partners in the ecosystem to support the customers in solving their complex problems. (MT)

As automobiles prices in India go over the roof with not a decent set of four wheels to be found anywhere below INR 10,00,000 on-road, the auto industry – not only in India but the world over seems to adjust for a significant shift in technology, manufacturing, costs, expectations of buyers and the demand of the governments.

The shift in the world over for the auto industry isn’t charming to say the least with global giants like General Motors announcing huge layoffs ahead of potential turmoil. This is despite the automaker acknowledging earlier on the need to invest in alternative fuel technology and offering electric passenger vehicles.

With a market share of about 10 percent, it is behind Tesla in its home market. Tesla commands a market share of 48.2 percent as per the latest data published by Cox Automotive and Kelley Blue Book.

At the centre of the worry among automakers with a legacy the world over seems to be of the uptake in electric vehicles. It is slower than expected besides bringing competition from destinations that were until now least considered.

Besides inflation a big leading factor in markets like US and India, which has driven vehicle prices over the roof, automakers are also grappling with the geopolitical situations that could potentially disrupt the supply chains and drastically alter the prices of crude oil.

With many alternative fuel technologies such as bio-fuels, gaseous fuels and hydrogen still away from enjoying the popularity fossil fuels are, and to some extent electric/hybrid, the shifting world order for the auto industry is made complicated by the rush of various governments to tighten the regulations.

The considerable and quick elevation in prices in automobiles this factor is contributing too, has ensured that automakers address a demand trend that is not something that they were very successful at anticipating.

In India, the passenger vehicle market leader Maruti Suzuki moved away from diesel engines as the BS VI emission norms kicked in. This action seems to reflected through the sales of its Jimny lifestyle SUV as compared to that of the Mahindra Thar SUV, which is available with a petrol as well as a diesel engine.

The fact that a supplier like Cummins continues to invest in IC engines – diesel in particular – in indicative of the fact that the transition to alternative fuel technologies will still take a long time to come through.

When its does come through, it will not be just two fuels such as petrol or diesel, but a range of technologies that will have a higher bearing on costs, sustainability and convenience.

The cost to environment is a factor that seems to be not clear yet in the case of each alternative fuel technology. The gap between ‘green’ and ‘grey’ energy source is yet a considerable one to overcome.  

As it happens, a good number of jobs and enterprises in the auto industry – the world over – will be subject to greater scrutiny in terms of how they are able to navigate past the headwinds and best leverage the tailwinds.

Auto majors like General Motors and Stellantis are coming to face that scrutiny. In India too, the situation isn’t very different.  

The risk where people stop back and continue using their existing vehicles is likely to ensure a rethinking of strategy by the government regarding the route to a greener future that it would want to take without economically jeopardising the future of its people.  

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Bengaluru-based Tijil Rao from Dark Don Racing capped a brilliant run to his entire season, sealing the drivers’ championship in the LGB Formula 4 category in the 27th edition of the JK Tyre FMSCI National Racing Championship recently. 
At a race on the Kari Motor Speedway, Tijil opened a massive lead even before the last round was held. This was despite Saran Vikram – a seasoned racer – of Momentum Racing surprising one and all by winning the first and second races at the sporting event.  
Rao took it easy as Vikram pushed hard with him and Mehul Agarwal not very far behind. While Vikram timed 21:24.212 minutes, Mehul Agarwal timed 21: 25.349 minutes and Rao timed 21: 25.545 minutes. 
Back behind the wheel for the next round, Vikram again won the LGB Formula 4 race lapping well ahead of the field at 28:12.441 minutes. The difference in timing from the morning round was because of an increase in laps from 15 to 20 in the last race. 
In second position, Dhruvh Goswami put up a time of 28:15.943 minutes and Bala Prasath, 28:17. 392 minutes.
In the overall LGB Formula 4 standings, Rao topped with 87 points. Second place went to Bala Prasath with 45 points. Mehul Agarwal was third with 44 points. Vikram clinched the fourth position with 43 points. 
In the thrilling Royal Enfield Continental GT Cup presented by JK Tyre race, Navaneeth Kumar from Pondicherry pushed as hard as he could to win the 10-lap race in 13:01.601 minutes. He was followed by Anish Shetty who clocked a race time of 13:02.411 minutes and Manvith Reddy who managed to clock a time of 13:02.503 minutes. 
Navaneeth sealed the championship for the first time. Behind him, an interesting fight for the second and third places was evident as Anish Shetty and Rohan R were tied at 36 points each. Rohan took the lead of the two as he had won two races in comparison to one by Anish. Rohan was declared overall second.
 

The Supreme Court announced on 6 November 2026 that a person holding a driving license for a Light Motor Vehicle (LMV) can, without any specific endorsement, drive a transport vehicle having an unladen weight of less than 7500 kg.
The five judge Constitution Bench noted that no empirical data has been brought before it to show that LMV license holders driving transport vehicles are a significant cause of road accidents.
The additional eligibility requirement to drive transport vehicles will apply to only those transport vehicles which weigh more than 7500 kgs, the judges noted in their order. 
Adopting a harmonious interpretation of the provisions of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, the Court endorsed the decision in Mukund Dewangan v. Oriental Insurance Company Limited (2017) 14 SCC 663. The Court also approached the issue from the perspective of livelihood issues of transport vehicle drivers.
The order mentioned that, for licensing purposes, LMVs and transport vehicles are not entirely separate classes. An overlap exists between the two. The special eligibility requirement will however continue to apply to, inter-alia, e-carts, e-rickshaws and vehicles carrying hazardous goods.
The additional eligibility criteria specified in the MV Act and MV Rules generally for driving transport vehicles would apply only to those intending to operate transport vehicles exceeding 7,500 kgs – which is medium goods vehicle, medium passenger vehicle, heavy goods vehicle and heavy passenger vehicle.
The Court overruled the decision in National Insurance Co. Ltd v. Annappa Irappa Nesaria to the extent it held that after the 1994 amendment, a separate endorsement is necessary for an LMV license holder to drive a transport vehicle.
The Court said that its authoritative pronouncement would prevent insurance companies from taking a technical plea to defeat a legitimate claim for compensation involving an insured vehicle weighing below 7,500 kgs driven by a person holding a driving license of a 'Light Motor Vehicle' class.

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Ajay Gabhane of Nagpur purchased a Kia Sonet on the eve of Diwali. He mentioned that his family found it right to replace their aging sedan with an exciting compact SUV during the festive season.

Like Gabhane, Tushar Deshpande chose the festive season to purchase a new passenger car during the Diwali festive season in Pune.

It were the individuals like Gabhane and Deshpande who contributed towards a cheerful festive season and Diwali for the Indian passenger vehicle and two-wheeler industry.

After witnessing a slowdown in sales performance during the first and second quarter of FY2023-24, it was the festive season that saw the auto industry uplift its spirit on the back of higher passenger vehicle and two-wheeler sales, albeit asking the underlying challenges that saw dealers and their association go to town stating that inventory levels were at an all-time high.

Until 29 October 2024, passenger vehicle registrations reached a record 4,25,000 units, according to the Vahan data. The previous peak was in January 2024 at 3,99,112 units.

With the Diwali festival spreading into early November, it is expected that that the passenger vehicle registrations will bridge the 4,50,000 milestone. This would mean that almost 15,000 units were registered every day.  

Starting at a slower pace, the festive sales picked up pace only close to Diwali this calendar year with two-wheelers registrations marking the most surge. Inside of the two-wheeler domain, it was the electric two-wheelers that contributed wholesomely to the sales surge. Among India's top electric two-wheeler OEMs, Ola Electric lead the pack with TVS Motors a close second and Bajaj Auto a close third.

Contributing handsomely to what is already considered as the record sales year (FY2024-25) for electric two-wheeler sales stood at 109,643 units as on 28 October 2024, as per the Vahan portal data.

This electric two-wheeler sales performance in the country should provide an interesting insight into how the Indian EV market is progressing and shaping up as well. 

With the main celebratory period of Diwali falling during the last days of October made for an interesting trend in terms of October 2024 sales and November 2024 sales.

With a sale of no less than 115,000 units expected by the time Diwali gets over in early November 2024, a significant uptake in sales performance would have been written in the financial books as compared to the sale of 88,156 units in September 2024.

The superior performance of two-wheeler sales overall as compared to passenger cars during the festive season could be attributed to the uptake in rural markets of the country, read a report by Motilal Oswal Financial Services. During the festive season, the commuter two-wheelers experienced the highest traction among the ICE models and electric powered ones, the report mentioned.

In his LinkedIn post, Ravi Bhatia, President and Director, Jato Dynamics, averred, “India's automotive sector experienced a classic relief rally in October 2024, driven by festive sentiment and aggressive discounting. However, with the impending Vehicle Identification Number (VIN) year change requiring sustained discounts, questions arise about the rally's sustainability.”

The challenges, he said, were the sub-INR 10,00,000 passenger vehicle segment continuing to be under pressure, the upcoming VIN year change necessitating continued discounts and the question of demand sustaining post the festive season.
 

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