CEO speaks interview in IIF Journal

CEO SPEAKS

CEO SPEAKS

RHINO MACHINES PVT LTD Manish Kothari Managing Director Rhino Machines Pvt Ltd

³ There is a huge scope of improvement and adoption of low-cost automation in India, provided the Foundries and Machine/Academics work jointly to find localised solutions. ³ Foundry is the mother industry, if manufacturing has to grow in India, foundry has to play an important part.

COMPANY PROFILE Rhino Machines today is an aggregator of technologies and services with a strong socio-economic sustainable solutions. Bringing transformational solutions to the foundry industry like Industry 4.0, Rhino has been putting effort to make Foundry Industry “aspirational” to the new generation.

Starting to provide services to metalcasting industry in 1983 Rhino moved into Turnkey Projects and Machines in 1991 for Green Sand Moulding, No-Bake and Sand Reclamation.

In 2013 the company started to channelise tremendous human potential to a common long-term goal. In a five-year time they have completely

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CEO SPEAKS Reclamation for Core and Moulding Sand (Made in India). Thermal Sand Reclamation (Made in India); Diversifications and Partnerships – Social Entrepreneurship Partnerships: Swiss Model Vocational School-ACE Foundation, Waste dust and plastic brick plants – W2W Division, BioGas Modular Solutions and BioFertiliser – MSA BioEnergy, Women’s Ethnic wear, waste cloth upcycling and livelihood-Meemansa.

IFJ: What is the technological status of Indian foundry industry?

materialised the same. Rhino have a clear Mission of Developing and Establishing Waste Recovery and Energy Saving Solutions as a social responsibility.

Rhino have been recognised by UNIDO, IIF, GIS, Ministry of MSME, AEEE, GAP for their solutions to energy efficiency, technology, entrepreneurship, social collaboration.

Rhino is the only organisation who have been recognised by UNCTAD’s Empretec Programme for India and instrumental in pioneering the strengthening of enterprises and community with the UN Programme.

Manish Kothari: Our status is a mixed bag. We can see very old traditional technologies of hand moulding with molasses or cow dung cores, to some very modern processes adopted in our industry.

We have the appetite to digest and adopt new technology in the industry. Having worked in the Green Sand Process, I still see Hand Moulding and Fully Automated Robotic High Pressure Moulding Lines working in the country. However, from process technology, we are lagging behind in penetration, and only a few of the foundries have upgraded.

IFJ: How far modern technologies are used in Indian foundries of SME sector?

M K: During the year 2016, I had estimated that about 150 SME’s would adapt to

High Pressure Moulding every year, however, the actual is only about 20-25 per year. This is changing, but at a slow pace. Appropriate technologies, process knowledge and financial constraints are limiting the adoption of technology in India. The penetration may be only 10 to 15% than the need. Further, some of the modern technologies are not affordable, and also not manageable due to lack of competent skilled workforce.

IFJ: Modernisation needs huge investment – your opinion please.

M K: In my opinion, with the present available technologies majorly being imported, yes the investment is huge and non-affordable. There are certain areas where we have been able to bring down the investment and foundries of all sizes are now able to upgrade in high pressure moulding as the costs have come down to 1/3rd. But this is happening in only some areas, and therefore modernisation as on today needs a lot of investment in most of the areas.

IFJ: How the country’s SME foundries can avail benefits of low-cost automation?

M K: There is a huge scope of improvement and adoption of lowcost automation in India, provided the

Rhino provide 24x7 sales, service back-up for process, online support through Internet connectivity, operations, maintenance and plant management with technologies likeMultiFlexFM Moulding Technology – Manageable High-Pressure Moulding Solutions; rEcoFlex – Energy Efficient and Clean Sand Handling Solution; Robo FM – Combination of Robotics with the High-pressure Moulding Line; Green Sand

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CEO SPEAKS Foundries and Machine/Academics work jointly to find localised solutions. We have been able to bring low-cost automation to foundries only when they partnered us as machine suppliers, and jointly worked out the Return of Investment Matrix. This is one of the largest gaps today in our industry, as we do not have the trust between supplier and buyer, which does not allow the new solutions to get experimented and established.

IIF can work with Incubation Centres or Institutional Bodies, bringing Foundry, Machine Manufacturer, Academic Bodies on one platform under a common umbrella. I have now started working with UNCTAD’s Empretec Programme and building this common platform where the stakeholders can talk in the same language, and work on common goals. We have the knowledge, we have the skill, we only need to stitch the people together for which UN has given us a linkage building programme.

IFJ: Give some tips on how foundries could increase their competitiveness.

M K: Perhaps this could be the one single agenda which can drive the entire ecosystem. Competitiveness is a combination of gross profit and scale. It can be made sustainable by ensuring a YoY growth and establishing a system which will allow this growth. The first

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step is to start measuring what is done with a higher level of granularity, means breaking down the processes into smaller parts, and start analysing each. This will require the involvement of the entire value chain of suppliers, employees and customers to drive in and work together.

UNCTAD’s Competitive Mission and setting up Indices on monitoring enterprises, industry verticals can be derived by the installation of entrepreneurial competencies deep down into the system to the last mile. This in our case is helping

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in building ownership in the organisation’s growth, ideas from the bottom to the top, deliberated and implemented.

This becomes a habit, and moves into character by practice, and ultimately the wastes are identified by the experts of the operation in collaboration with others, as all have the same interest. I have seen this closely for about a year while adopting the framework of the UN programme Empretec. Work on the Culture, Competitiveness will be the outcome – one simple advice from my perspective.

CEO SPEAKS IFJ: How far quality consciousness is required to compete in global market?

M K: Quality is a must, and most of the transnational and global players are finding “Reliability” and “Consistency” in Quality as one of the stumbling blocks when working with Indian manufacturers.

From my experience I have seen that it is not that we do not know how to make good quality, it is just that we are not in the habit of doing so. This is a cultural shift for all of us, starting from top management. Lot of tools and systems have been adopted from Japan, Europe – but this is instruction-driven, and does not come as part of our habit. We have found that if the culture is built, starting from the top management, things can happen, and if not, first the top has to change their mindset. To scale up the setting of quality standards derived from the team is essential. Since I was weak in this aspect of quality, Empretec and its framework helped me improve my quality consciousness, and in it I also found a tool which is now the basis of building systems from bottom up.

IFJ: How use of modern management tools enable foundries produce quality castings at lower cost?

M K:The involvement of the operating team in defining standards, building a community within the organisation, allowing the team to interact and learn by moving out of their comfort zone, and thus improving their efficiency will perhaps be the management tool I would support. Once the culture is embedded and the motivation is built, solutions will come from within the system.

IFJ: Is it necessary to form foundry clusters? If yes, then why?

M K: Clusters surely are required, but the formation should have a shift from the traditional way. The cluster should be driven on a specific agenda, which caters

to areas which perhaps cannot be done individually. The cluster however, may not become a production unit, but a test base for adopting the new technologies. For example, a sand reclamation plant may service only the foundries who cannot afford their own plant, and be a test bed for larger foundries who can install the plant after validation. 3D Printing, Solidification, Training centres all can be part of the clusters to help foundries adopt new solutions.

IFJ: What types of diversification/ transformation would help metalcasting industry tackle upcoming challenge?

M K: The owners/decision makers need to start having time to explore and understand new changes. The readiness to change and adapt will come again through building of systems – again bringing to change in the way we think and how we behave. The challenge is more internal for the entrepreneur to change, the obstacles outside will keep rising, and as long as we are ready to face it, we will overcome any external challenges.

IFJ: Is ”Green Foundry” a dream or truth?

Please comment.

M K: Green Foundry – how do we define it? From my definition yes, it is a truth, and it is affordable in long term. Green to my view is optimising the utilisation of resources, minimising the use of natural resources, and providing an environment worth working in. Energy Efficiency, Dustfree and Attractive foundries are surely possible, if we desire to build them.

IFJ: Are Smart Foundries coming up in India? Please throw some light on this area.

M K: To have smart foundries is not difficult, and as shared in my several presentations, and above, till we have a shift in mindset to work with data, and bring down the granularity of data, we may not be able to adapt the

technological advantages of making our foundries smart. Even to use simple energy monitoring and management of melting section at a very low cost has not been successful, as we have resistance sometimes from the top, and sometimes from the bottom. Smart is not possible without a major cultural shift from top to bottom.

IFJ: In which way foundry industry practically support “Make in India” campaign?

M K: Foundry is the mother industry, if manufacturing has to grow in India, foundry has to play an important part.

The direct and indirect sale of castings produced in India have a great potential as we are only 2.5% of the global market in exports as per EEPC study. The market is available, we only need to get ready and prepare ourselves to make this vision come true.

IFJ: Could metalcasting industry help the country raise its GDP? How? M K: Every MT of casting produced involves another 10 MT of other materials.

Foundry has a very long value chain tail, and is able to impact the GDP across sectors – materials, services, education, technology, machines etc. Casting is also at the helm of machine building, and they both work in tandem.

IFJ: What should be the role of foundry industry in protecting environment?

M K: Work and partner with suppliers and buyers to first document the footprint, and find ways and means to reduce the carbon foot print, increase the resource efficiency and thus lead to overall improvement in the environment around us. This is not impossible, and Indian Minds have the wherewithal to do it. Just needs to start from somewhere. We have already been able to impact to a certain extent.

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