As a technology player, Autodesk has been enabling manufacturers to evolve and adopt advanced CAM solutions to take their businesses to the next level. With its new subscription model, Autodesk has further democratised its software solutions for the benefit of its customers. By doing so, in a way, it is also contributing to the ‘Digital India' campaign that aims to make technology accessible to all.
Coimbatore based S&T Machinery (P) Ltd. (STM) recently inaugurated its expanded machine tool manufacturing facility at Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu. The inauguration also marks a positive step ahead in the ‘Make in India' direction. Interestingly, both Autodesk and STM have joined hands together to enable a one shop stop model for STM that will sell value to the customers and offer an integrated hardware and a software solution. Customers/End-Users will benefit more from this model as they will get original licensed Autodesk software along with the best-in-class machine tool builder from STM. And this arrangement between Autodesk and STM can be certainly termed as ‘Digital India' meets ‘Make in India'!
The Machinist travelled to Coimbatore and caught up with Pankaj Gauba, Head - Digital Manufacturing - India & Middle East, Autodesk India Pvt. Ltd. and D. Shanmugasundaram, Managing Director, S&T Machinery (P) Ltd. to understand the details of this arrangement between Autodesk and STM.

Dream come true
To start off with, D. Shanmugasundaram or Shan as he is popularly known as, gave a brief background about STM's foray into machine tool building. "It was a long dream for us to foray into manufacturing. For about eight to nine years, we have been talking to the President of Manford (Taiwan) about this. At that time, the Manford team was busy in setting up a plant in China and they asked us to wait. But days were passing, and we thought that we must give back something to the industry and fortunately the ‘Make in India' programme came.
"Many people outside India started saying that India is progressing, and the Manford President James Hsieh called me and said that let us start something. So, he told us that Manford would help us setting up the facility and transfer the technology. Subsequently, our people went there, some of their people came here and it started rolling. We began with three models, but James motivated us saying that it is possible to do all the models."

(Continued on the next page)