For an engineer, the more challenging a project, the more she/he enjoys it. What works even better is if the engineer creates something that gets patented. And, more so if it’s an ‘Offensive Patent’, which in other words is a patent which claims exclusivity of an invention with right of enforcement against any infringement, primarily to keep competition at bay in the marketplace. Pradeep Kumar Thimmaiyan, CTO, DICV (Daimler India Commercial Vehicles), says that the number of Offensive Patent applications by the engineering team in his company is on the riseIn 2023, an estimated 14 Offensive Patents were filed for by the DICV engineering team. “That was the highest we have done so far on an offensive side,” Thimmaiyan tells ETAuto. There’s a ‘Defensive Patent’ too, which helps an individual/organisation to avoid or settle any future infringement lawsuit against it. There has been a stronger focus on filing for Offensive Patents by the engineers in Chennai after the reorganisation of Daimler AG in 2018 which saw the German major’s commercial vehicle and passenger vehicle businesses becoming independent entities.
14 may not seem an impressive number, but when looked at the challenging nature of the filing process, and the size of the DICV engineering team, achieving a double digit may be seen as a feat. Every application has to cross three filters – in DICV, Daimler Truck’s global tech centre in Bengaluru, and finally in Daimler Truck’s Asia HQ in Japan, before its goes to Germany. “Through that then you cross double digit with the team size of this is the greatest thing,” says Thimmaiyan with a sense of pride. He leads a team of a little over 500 engineers in Chennai, of which around 200 are dedicated for Mitusubishi Fuso, which is a part of Daimler Truck.
An approximate ratio of defensive:offensive patents filing trend is 100:1, says Thimmaiyan, highlighting the special status an offensive patent holds. “it’s easy to break defensive patents but not the offensive patents,” he says.
Such opportunities could help orgnisations in a scenario when there’s intensifying competition to attract and/or retain talent in the automotive industry. For many engineers in the industry, the “Northstar” is an engineering patent from Germany or Japan. ”That’s the aspiration. People working here might have patents from Japan or from Germany,” says Thimmaiyan
Any improvement = Better Business
So, what are the areas in which the inventions by the DICV engineers are applied for patents? Without specifying them, Thimmaiyan says, “We are working on developing better solutions. That’s where the patents come, right? Whatever we do, we want to add more value to our customers.” Engineering, “anyone can do”, with all the talented minds and tools available in the industry, says Thimmaiyan.
The solutions being developed aim at lowering the TCO (total cost of ownership),improved uptime, and enhanced safety. Introduction of the Driver State Monitoring System in DICV’s trucks seems to have also helped a great deal. “One of our customers, who also had his own data gathering methods, told me that after the DSM was introduced, the unsafe instances reduced by 96%,” says Thimmaiyan.
He says that this is a reflection of working on the principles of the Heinrich Safety Matrix, which states that for every major accident there are 300 minor ones that do not cause any injury. The idea is to identify and prevent the 300 minor instances through engineering better solutions. ”Actually in some cases, you could save half a month or one month of the truck owner’s revenue for the year (by avoiding a major accident),” says Thimmaiyan.
DICV’s trucks for tomorrow
Over its first decade, DICV’s BharatBenz has been advancing as a challenger brand in the domestic commercial market dominated largely by Tata Motors and Ashok Leyland. Thimmaiyan and the team’s job is not easy. “If I look back at the last few years, of all the new developments that we did, when we start every new program, we know the customer a little better than the previous one. That way we keep getting closer and closer and closer to the customer in terms of understanding how his business operates,” says Thaimmaiyan.
Defining the problem statement is very crucial to design the technology/engineering roadmap. For Thimmaiyan and team, there are multiple of them, all encapsulated in his statement, “The changing landscape of Indian trucking industry”. The key aspects are regulatory, changing dynamics of the country, “which eventually affects the commercial vehicle industry”. and third, the changing needs of customers in terms of how the businesses are run today compared to the past. And “last but not the least”, the twin trends of transition in terms of fuels, and softwarisation.
Outside of the industry. Government policies can have an impact on the ecosystem too. “How do you predict that? And how do you use all this and then see, where should I spend my energy? Where should we focus in terms of developing solutions?” All these questions cumulatively are a larger problem statement for Thimmaiyan and team to address. And, the story would be the same for their industry peers too.
It’s a transformation phase that the automotive industry is going through, And the end of it, it’s convenience that will prevail, in terms of technology, and if it has to be something else then there has to be external force, believes Thimmaiyan. “Whatever we say, we are in a B2B business, and we are selling a solution which our customer uses to make his revenue and profit”, he says.
Whatever the new fuel and technology solutions, Thimmaiyan sees a radical change coming in the commercial vehicle industry. “Compared to the last twenty years, we’ll see a completely different kind of trucks in the next 20 years, and also in terms of the way of selling, the way of using, everything in this transition, and there is no crystal ball with any of us”.
