EMS in India Spotlight: Syrma SGS

Syrma SGS set up local supply chains and manufacturing processes to reduce costs for businesses looking to launch their mobile phone antennas in the Indian market. This reduction in manufacturing cost allowed clients to stay competitive. They have a well-earned reputation for manufacturing high-quality electronics at competitive prices for the automotive, medical, and telecom industries.

Challenges

A client in the US specializing in large, high-cost antennas wanted to launch their product into the growing but highly competitive Indian market. While the antennas had been successful in its home market, the US’s large shipping costs and expensive production processes made a profitable launch in the Indian market unlikely. This, coupled with the fact that the current specifications for the antennas weren’t ideal for the Indian market, led them to contact us for help since a large market for the product already existed. Our task was to refine the product specification, manufacturing method, and supply chain and advise on local regulations to allow for a profitable and successful product launch.

Solutions

The first step to addressing this challenge was to study and understand the original product and the technology it was built on and comparing this to the needs of the Indian market. We created a two-phase plan to bring the antennas to the market at a price point that would enable them to be highly competitive compared with similar local products. The manufacturing of the antennas was localized to India, as the original product was large and bulky when constructed, which allowed shipping costs to be significantly reduced since individual components are much easier and cheaper to ship. Second, we gradually shifted the supply chain to India; sourcing components locally wasn’t only cheaper and reduced shipping and transport costs further.

At this point, the antennas were modified to suit the Indian market further. Some features and functions were removed because, while desirable in the U.S., they weren’t a fit for the local market. This further reduced the bill of materials and enabled the product to be sold profitably. By localizing the supply chain and modifying the design to suit the local market, a product of similar quality to the original one was produced with a reduction in production costs of almost 40%. This allowed our client to gain a significant market share of the fastest-growing mobile phone market in the world. We used our understanding of the local market with that of the product and the technology behind it, which allowed us to re-engineer their product and take it from a loss-leader to a highly profitable offering.

Successes

We contribute our 40 years of design and manufacturing expertise spanning multiple diverse markets. We look forward to discussing how we can deliver world-class products for OEMs across the globe. We understand our home Indian market, familiar with its vast regulatory and selling environments. We foster growth opportunities within India through our strong technology incubation ecosystem. We also assist global OEMs in entering the Indian market by leveraging the local supply chain and favorable operating environments for cost reductions.

Our flagship Chennai location opened in 2006 and lies within a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) for electronics manufacturing, offering economic incentives for imports and exports. This primary facility is within 90 minutes of the Chennai seaport and 20 minutes to the international airport. Additional road and rail connectivity links to the rest of India and beyond and infrastructure advantages with faster import and export clearances. We also have labor force flexibility, both technical and manual, to scale to demand rapidly.

Syrma SGS has been the preferred value creator for its customers over the last 40 years through innovative and efficient Electronic System Design and Manufacturing. We provide high-mix, flexible volume, precision OEM manufacturing. Our one-stop-solution electronics manufacturing services (EMS) includes product design, quick prototyping, PCB assembly,  Box build, repair & rework and automatic tester development services. Syrma SGS also offers OEM solutions for RFID tags & inlays and high-frequency magnetic components. We serve global OEMs in 20+ countries and have supplied several hundreds of million units.

Take a look at their website for more information, including case studies in automotive, healthcare, IT, consumer, railways, and industrial.