CXO of the week: Basant Sharma, Vice President (VP), Detroit Engineered Products(DEP)

Detroit Engineered Products (DEP) was established in the year 1998 as a software technology based firm with its headquarters located in Troy, Michigan, USA. We started our India operation in Chennai during the 2000 and since then we are growing. We have offices in eight location worldwide. With more than 500 customers, we work with almost all OEMs, automotive, major tier ones companies.

It also work across industries such as, aerospace, consumer goods electronics, biomed, and oil and gas. But predominantly, our main business comes from the automotive Sector which contributes to about 80- 85% of the business.

Recently we have engaged in an interview with Basant Sharma, Vice President (VP) of Detroit Engineered Products (DEP). He talks about the startup journey and what DEP has been up to.

Introduction.

Detroit Engineered Products (DEP) was established in the year 1998 as a software technology based firm with its headquarters located in Troy, Michigan, USA. We started our India operation in Chennai during the 2000 and since then we are growing. We have offices in eight location worldwide such as US, Japan, Canada, China, and are preset worldwide with a wide network of partners.

We have two major verticals, when it comes to our offerings. Firstly, we provide engineering services where we work with the customers to do their turnkey projects. We provide services to transform the entire product development starting from bechmarking studies for design iterations, doing full blown CAE evaluation, value engineering,  lightweighting and prototyping across industries. Secondly, we have our unique proprietary software, MeshWorks which is an integrated CAE platform that transforms the ever aspect of the product development process.

With more than 500 customers, we are proud to say that that we work with almost all OEMs, automotive, major tier ones companies. We also work across industries such as, aerospace, consumer goods electronics, biomed, and oil and gas. But predominantly, our main business comes from the automotive Sector which contributes to about 80- 85% of the business. As a growing company, with more than 500 employees, we are trying to expand our company globally with new employees joining us every week.

What is your company’s USP that sets it apart from competitors?

CAE has evolved in the last few years to give the customers varied options. Using DEP MeshWorks as a single user integrated platform, they can utilize the modelling process to create CAE models far faster than most other technologies on the market. They will also be able to develop and optimize new concepts. Our customers may carry out several processes, such as optimization, concept generation, and design, using a single platform. This aspect of multi-disciplinary tools provides substantial ROI, which can be calculated with the man-hours saved. Since we can provide solutions using our own custom software, we offer a high degree of flexibility and customization to the customer.

What, as per you, are the five important things that DEP should be looking at today?

There are a lot of internal and external factors that DEP is looking at. The most important thing DEP is looking at is ensuring customer success. Going above and beyond to ensure customer success is critical to a thriving business. Next would be investing in people and technology. You cannot be a technology company without making the right investments in people and technology. If the recession has taught us anything, it is the importance of a solid business continuity plan, which can ensure undisrupted customer service no matter what situation is thrown at you. Economic trends and technology adoption is a key area to be looked into as well as it directly affects companies.

What are the applications of DEP products in a changing world?

DEP works with companies on creating innovative solutions to real world problems. We have worked on a range of solutions over the years, to help clients address the problem they were solving.  One of the interesting products we developed was a drone that incorporated radar technology and sensors to deter birds from aerial spaces, that were causing damage to equipment. Another product that we had designed is an in cylinder combustion sensing technology with which we can monitor cars to emission (CO, NO) levels in real time. We also design a driverless people autonomous people transporter, which is already in operation in a prominent global smart city. DEP has been working on and will continue to work on a number of products in cutting-edge technology.

What changes is DEP bringing to the industry?

The biggest differentiator that DEP brings to the market is that we own and develop our own CAE platform in house. This results in a very high level of customisation that we can bring in CAE services. On the product development fort, owing equipment and some of the key domain experts gives us access to a high level of technology and service offerings that we are able to deliver consistently.

What role does AI play in the development of your products and services?

We are in the business of engineering data. We help organizations optimizes their product performance. This is math data-based approach that synchronizes multiple disciplinary product performances and advises the design team on how design parameters affect product performance. This is model data based predictive approach. We analyze pool of engineering data available in organization and help capture key learnings so that design team could leverage them in their product development. Our tools, techniques and methods do help businesses transform their product development cycle. Some of the tools we have built help organization that are involved in additive manufacturing to optimize the support for the parts. Our sensor and IoT has already been deployed to capture the data from engines in real time to make prediction on the products of combustion inside every cylinder of engine for every cycle. This makes closed loop real time control possible.

And our development team is currently working on implementing some advanced AI methodologies that facilitates MeshWorks users during various development stages. With the implemented intelligence there will additional insights provided to users on even minute impacts for any given use cases of Morphing, CAE Process automation, etc. With all the uploaded data the software will compute the necessary factors and provide the user more clear result for better optimization using features and pattern recognitions.

How does simulation Technology Improves Quality in Manufacturing Industry?

Very important, design simulation is one of the critical points in the past for manufacturing industries. I'm glad that with our technologies and through other technologies, CAE makes manufacturing assessments easier in a digital way.  For instance, if you take injection molded process, you could put your gate location where you're putting the material, the temperature, then run the simulation. If you see a defect in your actual part, those defects could be early optimized by doing CAE assessment.  That’s the immediate advantage having simulation. Otherwise you have to build the tools which will cost millions of dollars. Optimization can be done with all these parameters checked up in the gate location combined with other structural parameters. This process not only optimizes your component for manufacturing, but at the same time considers the product’s performance and weight as well.

How will work-from-home lead to a paradigm shift in the IT industry?

A few years ago, not a lot of companies even allowed regular work from home, and in the IT space in particular. The last 2 years have brought about a paradigm shift in the mindset of companies about the efficiency their teams can achieve when working from home. Companies are now making more investments to sustain their employees in a hybrid model which many business see as the path forward even post the pandemic. Work from home by itself has affected people on a personal and individual level differently, and its long term effects still remain to be seen.