Traditionally, automobile manufacturers have been involved in the process of building vehicles, selling them to customers, and supporting the customer from a service perspective. In the current digital era, Tata Motors is moving beyond that.
Typically, a customer purchases a vehicle for a variety of purposes and expects to gain a certain kind of experience with the same. According to Gopinath Jayaraj, CIO, Tata Motors, the organisation is taking a closer look at what the customers are experiencing using the products and finding ways to enhance the same.
Established in 1945, Tata Motors is India’s largest automobile manufacturer with a revenue of Rs 2.82 lakh crores and more than 75,000 employees
While Tata Motors is improving its products, it is aggressively transforming its enterprise architecture into a more flexible, modern digital platform, as well as leveraging various aspects of digital & technology.
The transformation of enterprise architecture has been happening for a few years now, and this has enabled Tata Motors to understand customer behaviour and enhance it.
For example, Tata Motors now has a range of connected vehicles. The digital technology embedded within the product (for eg Tata Nexon EV) allows the customer to experience it whether they are inside the vehicle or not.
“The connected module embedded within the vehicle transmits data to its digital ecosystem through the cloud, and eventually to the application in the hands of the customer. The customer then is able to see a range of associated information related to the car, such as its remaining charge and range, its location, the nearest servicing centre and charging station, etc. The customers can also give commands such as switching on the AC, and unlocking the vehicle from a distance, remotely,” says Jayaraj.
Tata Motors also launched Fleet Edge, a connected vehicle solution for fleet management. The solution helps customers improve their business operations through trip management, expense management, and maintenance planning. Currently over 180K connected Tata CVs are running on Indian roads with these upgraded connectivity features.
Overcoming transporter complexity with digitisation of spares ecosystem
Transporters expect their trucks to be running almost 24/7 on the road and that’s how they make their profits. Whenever the vehicle faces a breakdown and gets off-road due to mechanical issues, it becomes a challenge for transporters as delivery gets delayed, eventually hampering their customer’s satisfaction.
While Tata Motors has a large dealership network across the country, in some scenarios, trucks could face mechanical failure at a remote location.
Being a commercial vehicle manufacturer that values its customers’ success, Tata Motors understood this challenge and accelerated the process of helping truck owners by getting the spare and mechanic at the right place to get it fixed.
The manufacturer has digitised its customer service and spare parts ecosystem. E-Dukaan is the company’s online spare parts marketplace and the Bandhu app connects drivers and truck owners with roadside garages and mechanics.
“The company’s mechanic ecosystems are connected through our Bandhu program and allow customers to create job cards on the fly, and order spares online,” says Jayaraj.
The moment Tata Motors receive a VOR (Vehicle-off-road) call registered, (either through the digital portal or a call), the support team starts figuring out the critical spare that’s required and putting out a DigiVOR order into the system
Digi-VOR initiates an automatic search across all spare inventories that Tata Motors has with the dealer distributors, and authorised service centres in the vicinity of that vehicle.
“We also enable the back-end system to place an order for that part so that it gets delivered into the hands of the mechanic and then they are able to bring it to the vehicle as fast as possible,” he adds.
This initiative led to a 78 per cent reduction in the time it took for the trucks to come back on the road.
Through this digital intervention, Tata Motors is able to enhance customer delight by ensuring the vehicle is quickly back on the road. At the same time, it also enables the manufacturer to ensure the sale of a genuine spare part to a customer who might have ended up buying any spare available in the grey market.
In FY22, the E-Dukaan initiative clocked a revenue of Rs 100 Crs.
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