Chennai: One of the Institution of Engineering & Technology’s (IET) prestigious lectures – the Lord Austin Lecture, was held in India for the first time. The first inaugural lecture was held on Saturday, 11 December 2010 at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras auditorium in Chennai. Nearly 240 attendees comprising of students, academia, industry professionals and journalists participated in 2010 lecture.

Titled as “Global Automotive Production Trends – The India Advantage”, this year’s lecture featured Inderjith Madireddi, former Vice President – Plant Head Operations of Hyundai Motors India. Inderjith has over 37 years of experience in the manufacturing industry and has been associated with top ranked companies like Hyundai Motors India, Mitsubishi Motors, Ashok Leyland and Hindustan Motors.

Shekhar Sanyal, Country Head, IET India said, “We were elated to have held this lecture in Chennai alongside the diamond jubilee celebration of the IET’s Chennai Local Network. We were also glad that this prestigious lecture was well received by the Chennai audience – one of India’s fastest growing auto manufacturing hubs. As part of its endeavor to spread awareness about science, engineering and technology, the IET has plans to bring more prestigious lectures to India next year. ”

The talk covered the production techniques used in the automotive industry. His talk also focused on deriving cost effectiveness of the automotive production technology and the need for better understanding of how to build reliable systems to tackle increasingly scarce skilled manpower. He shared practical examples from his experience of over 3 decades in the Indian automotive industry.