ET GBS: India to become one of largest manufacturing bases for world, says Jean-Pascal Tricoire, Schneider Electric

India will be one of the four major manufacturing hubs for Schneider Electric, Jean-Pascal Tricoire, chairman and CEO of the company, told ET in an interview at the ET GBS. The company also sees India as one of its largest export bases. Edited excerpts:

How is Schneider's business in India doing and what are your near-term plans?
India has been our fastest development area over the past 20 years. So, it is already very much in our focus. And there are major reasons for that. India is the centre of gravity for urbanisation, industrialisation, and of course, digitisation. The need for energy here will be enormous as we go forward. The country will build a large part of its infra in the next 25 years.


The priority remains to bring energy, which is affordable and safe, to everybody in India. Then there is the supply of energy and energy transition, which happens through demand. Transition happens when your car is becoming electric, your building is becoming net-zero and when your home is becoming net-zero because the cheapest, greenest and the safest energy is the energy you save.

In terms of ease of doing business, what changes have you seen?
India is a huge country for us. We have 30 factories and now we are building five new ones. We also believe India is going to become one of our largest manufacturing bases for the world. Today, 50% of what we manufacture in India is exported. We have been doing 'made in India' for a long time. We see India as one of the four key hubs in the world for us - North America, Europe, India and China.

Do you think there is a need to create demand since in developing countries it takes a lot of time for demand to build on its own?
Priority is to deal with homes, buildings, manufacturing and to make them more efficient. And that is possible with digitisation and which country is better placed with its worldwide-recognised expertise in digitisation than India. So, the priority is digitisation - to measure energy footprint and to reduce energy consumption. The second is electrification, because that is the only way to cut emission. And the third point is to invent the grid of the future, which we are already doing in large parts of India.

Hydrogen is necessary, but it's going to be tackling long-haul transportation and finally there's going to be a need to deploy tech for negative carbon emissions.

India's focus has been on carbon emissions and recent G20 talks have also focused on it. Where do you think India is headed?
I think the priority remains to make India more decarbonised and more efficient. We need to focus first on where we can eliminate all carbon emissions. And here companies have a major role to play. Because when we make buildings, build homes and manufacture, all companies can become more efficient, green, and sustainable.

Have the policies and reforms in the power sector been a game changer?
We've participated in a number of projects... water networks, data centres, grids, smart cities, are where we have benefited from the investment in infrastructure.