We are on a transformation journey: Harman India's Krishna Kumar G

Not only does Harman serve some of the world’s biggest car makers—Toyota accepting Saras back then helped the product take off—but also India’s top car makers Tata Motors and Mahindra. “Take a Tata car for example, and what used to be seen in a Mercedes or a BMW is now available in a sub-`25-lakh rupee car. And this is only going to intensify,” Kumar says.

Harman’s automotive teams in India are deeply involved in global projects, collaborating with other sites around the world, he says. For example, the India team conceived the need for an entry/mid segment IVI (in-vehicle infotainment) platforms, which were used to launch multiple OEM cars across the globe.

They developed Harman Automotive’s first Android-based IVI/Cockpit platforms. And they contributed to both hardware and software development of a product called ‘READY CONNECT’, helping OEM customers get their cars to the market faster. They also developed an audio framework and acoustic tuning tool for Harman’s AudioworX software, recognised for the in-cabin audio experience it provides.

With Samsung in the mix, and the smartphone giant’s backing, “our motto is, ‘consumer experiences. Automotive grade’,” Kumar says. And that the company has a state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Pune adds to their value proposition.

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In the coming years, there is immense opportunity as India is under-penetrated in terms of the car ownership, Kumar says, while one must recognise challenges ranging from poor roads to bad driver behaviour.

Even as Chinese car makers churn out new cars and features faster than ever, Indian car makers will move to keep pace. “I’m very sure that India will become the focal point for innovation in cars in the coming five years,” he says.

This also means Harman Automotive’s India teams will only play a bigger role in the company’s future. And as part of embracing that future, there’s also a cultural transformation underway, Kumar says. “This involves transformation across the board, from the way we interact with customers to the way we do development or the way we deploy software.”

The company is working on a multi-pronged strategy for transformation, which is currently in its third year, and goes well beyond the usual suspects like reskilling. Change is also coming to how the company reacts to market circumstances, collaboration, and how an innovation can be sustained over a long period. There are also key people in India who are able to influence the outcomes in other Harman sites, he says.

Cultural changes are happening too in areas such as communication between individuals all the way to across the company. There is also an effort to provide people what is now catching on as “psychological safety” so that they can openly disclose problems and then still don’t need to worry about repercussions.

He also lays emphasis on what he calls the “say-do ratio”, which is his way of describing the need for leaders who walk the talk.

“It’s a journey,” he says.