Joel Rebello

Mumbai: At a factory in Puducherry, another of India’s sufficiency tales has been scripted. But this time, it’s not food grains, nor pulses, nor spices.

Twenty years since ATMs or automated teller machines were introduced, India now exports ATMs to developed markets right from Australia and New Zealand to Scotland, for use by Citibank, HSBC and Standard Chartered.

US-based NCR Corp, the largest ATM manufacturer in India, is using its Puducherry plant to make ATMs for foreign markets as well.

Malcolm Collins, senior vice-president for global sales & marketing at NCR, says India has now become their hub for ATM manufacturing.

“India is now a net exporter of ATMs to other countries for us. The Puducherry plant exports dispensers and ATM machines for us and at the same quality that we used to manufacture in our earlier plant in Scotland,” Collins told DNA Money.

NCR has two other plants - in China and Hungary - which also cater to worldwide demand.

NCR had invested $3.7 million to double its ATM manufacturing capability last October.However, the company refused to divulge the plant’s capacity, citing disclosure restrictions.

“About 30-40% of our production will now be towards export commitment for other parts of the world,” a spokesperson of the company said.

Considering that 6,000 ATMs were added in India last year and NCR corners at least 50% of the market (3,000 ATMs), it can be estimated the company exports at least a thousand ATMs from India.

Besides NCR, another US-based ATM maker, Diebold, also has a plant in the country, in Goa. Diebold officials could not be reached for comments.

Though it was foreign banks which introduced ATMs to India in the late eighties, private sector banks like ICICI and HDFC, together with large public sector banks like State Bank of India, have made large investments to build their ATM networks since the turn of the century.

In the last two years, companies like NCR have shifted many of their manufacturing and R&D process to India from more expensive locations. NCR, for example, shifted its plant from Scotland.

“Two years ago 80% of our manufacturing were in high cost countries. However, that has changed now with 80% manufacturing in countries we describe as low cost,” Collins said.

So successful has the India experiment been that NCR, which employs about 2,000 people, last year added 25% staff. It plans to match that figure this year.

“We see a massive growth opportunity in India as banks here see the need for technology. There is also potential with ATM penetration in India only 34 per million population compared to 55 per million in China and 1300 per million in Western Europe,” Collins said.

The ATM orders are also flying thick and fast for NCR in India. The latest order is for installation of 300 ATMs and management of 1,900 operational ATMs for private sector HDFC Bank.

However, it is not only the ATM sector which interests NCR. The New York-listed company is also a very big player in the airline self check-in space in the US.

“Eight out of 10 airlines in the US are on NCR technology for self check-in and we are looking at the opportunity here too,” said Bob Tramontano, head of marketing at NCR.

Self check-in is still a new concept in India. Jet Airways has installed some such kiosks in Mumbai airport.

“We are already in talks with airlines to share our expertise in the self check-in space, we hope we can start by the year end,” said Pradeep Sen, managing director, India area, NCR.

Besides airlines, NCR is also open to partnerships with Indian software companies and service providers in India.

Source : DNA