The agreement was signed by Mr Shashank Shrivastava, Chief General Manager (Marketing) Maruti Suzuki and Dr V Sumantran Chairman, SUPRA SAEINDIA, in the city.
Maruti Suzuki India Limited, India’s leading car manufacturer, is all set to provide a brighter future to a number of young, enthusiastic and talented engineering students. Maruti Suzuki and Society of Automotive Engineers (SAEINDIA) signed an agreement today to support the SUPRA SAEINDIA 2011 competition. This competition promotes young engineering talent for automobile engineering and facilitates participants to conceive, design and fabricate formula-1 style sports cars.
The signing ceremony was graced by industry stalwarts including Dr Richard Kleine, President SAE International, Dr David Schutt, CEO SAE International, Mr Murli Iyer Executive Advisor, SAE International, Mr IV Rao, Managing Executive Officer (Engineering) Maruti Suzuki, Dr KC Vora, Deputy Director and Head, ARAI Academy, Mr Bharat Vedak, Executive Vice President, John Deere and Prof Sudhir Gupte, Convenor Supra SAEINDIA,
Young engineers get a platform
SUPRA SAEINDIA contest originated through the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE International) USA promises a level playing field to budding under graduate and post graduate engineers across India. The contest provides an opportunity to showcase their skills, understanding and passion for automobiles. The contest will see 44 teams create their dream cars and test at the renowned Madras Motorsport Club race tracks near Chennai. The winning car will be displayed at Asia Pacific Automotive Conference at Chennai in Oct‘11 and Auto Expo’12.
Maruti Suzuki actively promotes motorsports through various initiatives like Raid-de Himalaya, Desert Storm, Dakshin Dare, will provide engines to all participating teams in this initiative. Bharat Petroleum is the co-sponsor of the competition. Other sponsors include John Deere, SRM University and Vel Tech University. ARAI, Pune is sponsoring Engineering Design Award and ANSYS will provide training to the teams and provide simulation and design software.
Through this initiative Maruti Suzuki and SAE India are providing students, an innovative, hands-on and out-of-classroom education. This platform will enable the students to prove their capability in developing a car in real-life scenario.
On the occasion, Mr Shashank Srivastava,General Manager (Marketing) Maruti Suzuki said, “As a market leader, we at Maruti Suzuki have constantly acclimatized our products and services in tune with the changing needs and aspirations of our younger consumer. Just in the past five years the average age of our car buyers a drop of 10 years For these younger customers we make youthful and energetic cars, while not compromising on the value of fuel efficiency. This initiative with SAEINDIA helps to reinforce Maruti Suzuki’s strong connect with the youth”
Dr. V. Sumantran Executive Vice Chairman, Hinduja Automotive Ltd and Chairman of SUPRA SAEINDIA Steering Committee), who himself is a Motorsports enthusiast said,SUPRA SAEINDIA is an unique event that blends the challenge and excitement of motorsports with the learnings and experience in team work and engineering. The Auto Industry is fuelled by the energy and creativity of large number of professionals and technicians engaged within it. Especially in India where our industry is rapidly gaining maturity on a global scale, we will need to plan for a large intake of motivated and qualified young men and women. Maruti Suzuki supported this initiative of SAEINDIA and approached the Event Organizers with an aim to sponsor this event. We appreciate their support in this area.”
Dr. Richard Kleine, President SAE International said,“FORMULA SAE is an international student level competition in which teams from universities all over the world plan, design, analyze, fabricate and run a formula type car which is evaluated during a series of Static, Dynamic and Durability events like design, cost evaluation, presentation, acceleration, skid-pad, auto-cross, fuel economy and endurance. I am happy that SAE India is organising such and event as SUPRA SAEINDIA for the engineering fraternity.”
I.V. Rao,Managing Executive Officer (Engineering) Maruti Suzuki India Ltd. said, “As Maruti Suzuki expands and increases its product portfolio. We need in-house dedicated engineering capability. To our existing engineering strength of 1000 engineers we plan to add around 500 more in next year. These plans are in line with our plans expansion plans to manufacture 1.7 million cars annually.”
Prof. Sudhir Gupte, Convener, SUPRA SAEINDIA and Head of Automobile Engineering Department for ADIT, Gujarat thanked the sponsors for their support and supplying engines and transmissions to all participating teams. He also thanked ARAI, ANSYS, BPCL, John Deere, VEL TECH University, SRM University, Sardar Patel College of Engineering and A.D. Patel Institute of Technology for their support.
