International Conference on Advances in Design, Materials, Manufacturing and Surface Engineering for Mobility – ADMMS 2017, was organized in Chennai by SAE India Southern Section & B S Abdur Rahman Crescent University in July 2017.

Dhev Anandh, Senior Project Manager – CAE, was invited to be a session co-chair in the Modelling & Analysis technical session held as part of this 3-day conference.

Overall, 5 technical papers were presented:
• Simulation and validation of propeller shaft mounting brackets for heavy duty commercial vehicles
• Weight optimization of fork and axle of main landing gear for an unmanned aerial vehicle by FEM
• Experimental and numerical study on the effect of valve angle of EGR on exhaust gas flow
• Quantitative Evaluation of steering system rattle noise
• Combined effects of injection timing and fuel Injection pressure on performance, combustion and emission characteristics of a direct injection diesel engine numerically using CONVERGE CFD tool

Veerababu Mummina, Steering CAE Project Leader, represented Satven at the recent India Altair Technology Conference which was held in Chennai on the 01st and 02nd of August 2017.

He presented a paper on the automation of a complex load application process (pre-processing portion) related to resolution of abuse driving torques into corresponding forces on the rack and pinion at their appropriate locations as per the fundamentals of gear mechanics.

The automation was accomplished using TCL/TK scripts in HyperMesh.

This intricate scripting work attracted the attention of delegates & the jury and it was awarded the second prize in the process automation category.

CII Chennai chapter had organized a two-day industrial visit on 27 & 28 SEP in Chennai, as part of the

Manufacturing Excellence Study Mission 2017.

The mission was to provide a unique chance for talented personnel to understand various manufacturing practices and capabilities across sectors.

The invitation for participation was open to SMEs and companies involved with manufacturing engineering and interested in understanding the advanced manufacturing and quality processes.

Satven team was represented by Selvan Veerappan, R. Venkataraman and CV Lakshmi Narayana, who had the opportunity to walk through the Ashok Leyland, Saint Gobain and Daimler Truck plants and interact with the plant engineering teams at those companies. Detailed presentations were made by the companies to the study team and our enthusiastic associates gained process knowledge and the complexity involved in stringent process requirements to maintain the product quality.

Satven had participated in the 3rd edition of ‘Conference on Automotive Design & Styling’ organized by CII on 13th October 2017, at Hotel ITC Grand Chola, Chennai. The theme for the conference was “Design & Styling in India – Emerging Market”.

Delivery Head – Design, Mr. Mohan Desu, spoke during a plenary session on ‘Design & Styling Paradigm – India’s Roadmap 2030’ covering topics such as paradigm shift in Design & Styling of cars due to onslaught of new technology like Electric Vehicles, Connected Cars, Autonomous Cars, Changes in car ownership and 3D Printing. This talk was well received by the large gathering of industry experts.

The other notable topics covered in the Conference include:

Trends in the new way of Design Optimization by AutoDesk, showcasing the Bone-Growth design techniques in engineering design

Newer CAE methods and applications by Altair

How Mahindra is adopting newer technologies like Connected Cars in their vehicles

Introduction to the R&D and Incubation Center of IIT Madras

Latest trends in lighting systems design like Laser Lights by Assystems Europe

Inspirations from the ancient Indian art & history, for the Styling and Design of vehicles

Influence of Electrification and Autonomous driving on the automotive industry

Changes to the Powertrain technology and their influence on the environment

Satven set up a stall at this conference and the stall was visited by several seniors from the industry.

The 9th edition of NASSCOM Engineering Summit – 2017 with the theme ‘Digital Engineering: Convergence of Disruptive Technologies’ was held at Hotel Leela Palace, Bangalore, on September 21 and 22.

The event focused on convergence of disruptive technologies like Big Data, IoT, Industry 4.0 and how they support the ER&D sector to transform themselves and fully capture the benefits of the new digitized world.

Satven was Silver Sponsor at this prestigious summit which was attended by more than 600 professionals from renowned institutes and companies like the MIT, Daimler, Tata Motors, Mahindra, Maruti, Bosch, ZF to name a few.

Satven had set up a stall to showcase the engineering capabilities to the automotive world. Several delegates had visited the Satven stall and enquired about the offerings and were pleasantly impressed with the rapid progress Satven had made in the recent years.

The Satven delegation of senior management team was led by our respected CEO Mr. Rao S. Vadlamudi.

The summit was a great place to connect with professionals of various industry verticals from around the globe and surely a potboiler for cross pollination of cutting edge technologies and ideas for engineering a better future.

A two day leadership training program was organised at Indian School of Business (ISB) in Hyderabad, for the management and leadership teams.

On day one, more than 40 project leaders and project managers of Satven went through a session on leadership skills held at ISB. The session focused on nuances of working in emerging leadership roles – today’s times demand that budding leaders understand personal styles of leadership. Skills such as influencing individuals and cross team collaboration were discussed.

On the second day, more than 50 members of the leadership team including BDMs, attended an exhilarating session which focused on negotiation skills. A conceptual framework of negotiation in a two-party, multi-issue situation was taught. The Satven participants also learnt concepts such as power of alternatives, power of intelligence, and lateral influence. The speakers gave away pointers on how to create value before claiming value.

A one day outbound leadership training was organised for functional heads and other key associates of Satven, during the Annual Business Planning meetings.

The event focused on building high-performance teams by harnessing collective talents. This programme also included sessions offsite and adventure sports. During team-building activities there was a lot of camaraderie and creativity on display.

The main takeaways were time management skills, decision-making abilities and conflict management. The particpants also discussed cross-functional team collaboration and bridging execution gaps.

3 Box Solution: A strategy for leading innovation

Future proofed organizations work in parallel on the 3 horizons:-

Operational excellence

Search for growth

Creating the future

A 3-day workshop on our 3-Box model was held on March 5-7, 2017 in Dream Valley Resorts for our functional heads, business development managers, project managers, and a few other key associates. This is the third session in the series of workshops to make our organization future-ready.

Prior to this, a one day session for Project Managers and Project Leaders was organised on March 4 at The Park, Hyderabad.

In it, many business cases of how innovation can happen in an organization in a changing landscape were discussed.

The 4-day training program on 3-Box framework was conducted by Prof Viren Lall and Mr Neil Marshall from Change School, a UK-based management consulting organization. The sessions included long-term strategies for better user experience involving the Box-3 model. How to work in cross functional teams to reach tangible milestones was a vital learning.

Satvenites got together for a grand contest at our Hyderabad office to create stunningly resplendent rangolis. Many of the floor designs were theme-based with tastefully contrasting colours.

The associates, like true artisans, were so immersed in the activity that they didn’t even keep track of time.

This time BDM team was also present on the occasion to savour the visual treat of the colourful rangolis.

Later the rangoli creations were judged by the BDMs and the prizes were given to the winning teams.

Mazda celebrated the 52nd edition of “The Ekiden Road Relay”, which was held in March 2017 month. This event is hosted by Mazda annually at Hiroshima.

The relay race saw a bunch of enthusiastic participants from Satven Japan as well. The participants ran on a 16.3km-route.

The event was held in 1966 for the first time with an intent to communicate with and understand the needs of local communities. Over the years, it also has helped to improve camaraderie between colleagues.

This year saw around 2000 runners from 298 teams, both inside and outside Mazda. It was inspiring for the runners to see their colleagues on the track, running together.