Mahindra Pune Plant To Be First 5G-Enabled Auto Manufacturing Facility In India

Airtel has partnered with Tech Mahindra to deploy a captive private network at Mahindra’s Chakan facility, becoming the first of its kind in India. This is basically the deployment of the 5G for enterprise solution by Airtel and the factory in Chakan becomes the first 5G-enabled auto manufacturing facility in India. 

“Our 5G solution for enterprise will transform manufacturing operations in the country. We are thrilled to partner Tech Mahindra and Mahindra Auto to demonstrate this transformation and have made the Chakan manufacturing facility India’s first 5G-enabled Auto Manufacturing Unit. As the Industry 4.0 paradigm gathers momentum, reliable data networks will prove to be a key differentiator in factory & manufacturing performances. This is just the beginning, and I am certain we will showcase many more innovative use cases that will help redefine manufacturing in India,” said Ajay Chitkara, director and CEO, of Airtel Business. 

The Chakan plant manufactures cars like the XUV700, and the new Scorpio-N . The latest generation models are the most tech-heavy cars in the company's arsenal.  The other SUVs - Bolero Neo, Marazzo and Thar are manufactured at Mahindra’s Nashik facility which doesn’t have the new 5G network yet.  

And the 5G solution has enhanced the networking connectivity at Chakan which has improved speeds for software flashing which is a critical function for vehicle dispatches. Because of the ultra-low latency and hi-speed of the 5G network, Airtel and Mahindra reveal that managers can now undertake multiple software flashing sessions in parallel which has improved turnaround time for the operation, in process speeding up the manufacturing process. 

The computer vision (AI) based inspection process is now fully automated which is resulting in improved paint quality. The defects are now down to 1% as per Mahindra. 

“Airtel’s industry-leading integrated connectivity portfolio of #5GforBusiness along with Tech Mahindra’s industry knowledge to provide specialized services to customers, proven system integration capabilities, 5G enterprise solutions capabilities such as Factory.NXT, and its domain expertise in planning, designing, deployment, and management of private wireless networks for enterprises will benefit enterprise customers and accelerate the adoption of transformative network technologies like 5G in India. This partnership is in line with Tech Mahindra’s NXT.NOWTM framework, which aims to enhance ‘Human Centric Experience’, and focuses on investing in emerging technologies and solutions that enables digital transformation and meet the evolving needs of the customer,” added Manish Vyas, president communications, media, and entertainment business and CEO network services, Tech Mahindra. 

The Chakan facility had been using the Airtel private 5G network since January and this announcement is more about the addition of the captive private network at the Chakan plant. Airtel launched its 5G services in October this year, but for businesses, it had been testing private 5G networks for months before the public launch of the next-generation networks.