Zapata

So according to your logic it's passion that makes one engine more powerful, more reliable and better performing than almost any other engine in the past 4 years of formula 1?? It wouldn't have anything to do with technical excellence, ingenuity, innovation?

gavriil

Meaning there is no reason for Ferrari to say no to cost cutting if it guarranteed that quality would not be affected.

allmotor_2000

That's a pretty dumb-f**k comment representative of hick-town America - sorry for my French! It seems sad that jobs are 'leaving' the US, but unfortunateley the US government is doing nothing to retain jobs and/or increase productivity etc. The trade deficit is only going to increase and jobs leaving the country is not going to help!

allmotor_2000

Going back to the topic, why would Ferrari quality degrade with manufacturing in India - it would probably get better!

chef chris

:IBTM2R&P: ..:wtf:

gavriil

I dont know about better but for sure as good. In the end Ferrari engineers will give the green light on anything Tata designs.

Silver™

I am not sure that the original AP story quoted in the beginning is accurate. This is from the Tata press release...

http://www.tcs.com/0_media_room/rele...ne_Circuit.htm


So it seems that they will not be designing engines, instead they will work on the IT side. I know it is a shock for an Indian company to do IT consulting

Shawn S

Looks like I really stirred the pot with this one, which is exactly what I wanted to do.

Call me what you want. I speak from experience.
I’ve been in the Mechanical Engineering field since 1987 and dealing with Indian outsourcing at my current employer for the last EIGHT YEARS.
We’ve even had guys come over here and spend several months “working” along side us.
I even have one sitting in the cubical beside me.
I also have a 3FT American flag at the corner of my office so he can look up and remember where the fuck he is.
The quality of these people has been terrible at best.
I’ve done Engineering estimates for drafting time that have been exceeded by five or six times the hour budget.

The big thing of course is money.
A “person week” cost for an American drafter is around 1,600 to 2,000 dollars depending on experience.
A “person week” in India is 380-420 dollars.
As you can see, management looks at this and their eyes bug out.
Then they want as much work as possible sent over there so we can undercut our competitors on jobs.

Who’s left dealing with the mess…..ME.
I have to check, check and recheck their drawings and then deal with fabrication shops and/or end customers if something doesn’t get caught in time.
The company just announced that over the next three years they’re hiring 300+ more Engineering personnel in India while downsizing 30-50 more here in America over the same time period.
If I’m lucky, I’ll continue to stay above the curve and there will be a seat left for me when the music stops playing if you know what I mean.

Sorry to offend….But does that help explain my somewhat “slighted” view on this topic ???

thealliance15

Ferrari

Made in India

TypeSblkura

iTrader: (1)

hahaha..hah...ha

...your an idiot.

Sypher

This is getting fairly off-topic, IMO, but I feel a need to add something. In the IT industry, thousands of jobs were outsourced to India over the past few years. There was (and still is, I suppose) a big uproar about it claiming that the U.S. govt. shouldn't allow it to happen and that it is going to ruin the domestic IT industry.

However, just like Shawn was pointing out, many of the domestic companies are beginning to realize that the cost savings just wasn't there. A handful of large companies in India were flooding the global market with cheap labor, but that labor took much longer to do things than the experienced domestic labor. On top of that, once a worker from India started to actually produce at top-notch levels, he/she would then begin to demand top-notch pay.

This led to what I am seeing now, a move away from outsourcing overseas and back to local talent. The local companies are realizing that the monetary savings really wasn't there with the outsourcing, and having a worker physically located somewhere you can keep an eye on and mentor him/her is worth something.

So, who's fault is this mess? I wouldn't say it was India's. They were just doing what needed to be done in a global economy: find something someone wants to buy, and sell the heck out of it.

I wouldn't say it was the worker's fault. If you had a choice between poverty or grossing ten times the national average (just a guess, could be more/less), which would you choose? If it meant getting an H1B visa and going to a country where you had no friends and many people looked at you like you just killed their dog, would you still do it? It's a tough decision, especially for us here in the US to understand. It has been a loooong time since people here had to make decisions like that. The American Dream is becoming the World Dream, and workers striving for a better life can't be blamed.

I wouldn't say it was the U.S. govt.'s fault, either. Putting restrictions on this type of international trade would have been a step in the wrong direction. It's a little like Nemo's dad, Marlin, in Finding Nemo. Protecting his son from the rest of the world would have kept his son safe, but it would have also kept him from maturing and truly living. In this case, I think the domestic IT industry has matured because of this situation, and we are left with a stronger and wiser industry.

If I had to point a finger of blame, I'd point it at the CEOs and CFOs of the businesses that outsourced overseas just to make a quick buck. If it worked out for some of them and they are making money, good for them. But for the ones that lost all of their experienced workers and ended up with projects taking waaaaay to long to complete, customer service reps. that have a difficult time communicating with the customer, and a new cost of having to hire more quality assurance people to go over what the first-string quality assurance people were letting through, well, they played the game and lost. They lost, their former employees lost, their customers lost, and even the outsourced workers lost, since they won't have jobs for long either.

Which brings me back to Ferrari. If they have found a good company in India to help them out with building engines or doing IT, and they can do it cheaper, good for them. But they need to realize, as with all things in the capitalist world, cheaper doesn't always equal better. As long as they do their homework and pick the right people to work with, no matter where they are located, they should be fine. The key is doing their homework, though.

Shawn, I can only hope your company sees the error of its decision soon. I think you should be directing your frustration toward your company leadership instead of at the guy sitting next to you, though.

chef chris

You had me until the Nemo comment...

cusdaddy

Sypher: Excellent post. I work in the IT industry and I echo exactly what you said. The big rush during the past few years reduced short term costs, but luckily, a new view of the situation is starting to evolve. IT oursourcing won't go away, but hopefully corporations begin making more informed decisions and look at the longer term costs and benefits.

I agree as well. If it's to better the product, then I'm all for it. If it's to save costs, then I'd disagree with the decision.

gavriil

Sticking this one. Good thread.

Sypher

Yea, I had to pull that fish out of somewhere!

goldmemberer

Can India meet standards? Yes.

Is it an easy task to achieve? Fuck no.

Do I think Ferrari is going to do anything that will sacrifice the quality of their cost-no-objective vehicles? No, I fucking don't.

Lets not cross-compare industries either. This thread has gotten 10x the attention it deserved, which isn't bad, but hey.

KavexTrax

why would a relatively low-turnover, high-margin, premium brand company worry about penny pinching quality and costs to this degree and where it could compromise the name brand they've developed for DECADES, not to mention national pride?

makes no sense.

Next you will be telling me that Gucci or Prada purses are going to be made in China or in some arbitrary child labor hotspot country. Or that Tiffany diamonds will come from conflict diamonds.

thealliance15

im from an indian background i just find it funny that india will be making ferrari engines, im sure they'll do a fine job of it. even these damn italians are outsourcing that is what i find funny.

Eternal TL2k3

will the engine smell like curry?

gavriil

You're terrible