Indian hands turning wheels of global auto companies

Ketan Thakkar, reporting for the Economic Times:

The Indian R&D setup for Mercedes-Benz has metamorphosed from a tiny division with 20 staffers in Bengaluru, the IT capital of India, a couple of decades ago into a powerhouse of 5,000 engineers that is contributing significantly to new-age technology. The company is already preparing to double its office space as the scope of work expands significantly.

Additionally:

Ford India said in 2016 it would invest $195 million to set up a global technology and business centre in Chennai to leverage India as an innovation hub.

Bosch, the world’s leading auto component maker, has its biggest R&D centre in India. […] For years, Bosch has used India as a test bed for solutions to be adapted in other emerging markets. Likewise, the R&D team of Renault Nissan Technology Business Centre India is helping the Chinese R&D team in developing a small electric car.

India adopts strong net neutrality norms

The BBC:

The recommendations explicitly forbid operators from throttling data speeds for any online service, and mandates all content be treated the same.

Additionally:

Telecom operator Airtel was forced to withdraw a plan to charge extra for internet calls, and shut down a platform called Airtel Zero, which allowed customers to access a few mobile applications for free. […] Others, including Facebook and Google, were also forced to abandon their zero-rating platforms and deals. The most visible casualty was Facebook’s Free Basics service, which offered Indians free access to a limited number of websites.

Manton Reece:

I’ve now tried to reduce this feature to its simplest form that solves the problem of finding new users […] I’ve reverted the change from earlier this week and replaced it with a list of who someone is following that you aren’t following already.

Aces.

Samsung opens world’s largest mobile phone factory in India

VISHWAM SANKARAN, writing for The Next Web:

The new plant – located in the industrial city of Noida – will help Samsung gradually double its current annual production capacity in India from 67 million phones to 120 million in the next three years. The factory is also expected to provide at least 1,000 more local jobs.

This comes not long after news earlier this year that Apple is ramping up production of iPhones, Xiaomi plans to add 3 factories & Oppo will be setting up a $320m manufacturing facility. India’s smartphone market grew 14% last year with 127 million units shipped.

No brainer Micro Monday shoutout to @rosemaryorchard! Among the most helpful people I’ve seen online aaaand now host of Automaters with the cool David Sparks covering automation on Apple platforms. Looking forward to episode 1.

Production of made-in-India 6s iPhones begins

Writankar Mukherjee, reporting for The Economic Times:

Apple has started commercial production of the iPhone 6s in India since last week at the Bengaluru facility of its Taiwan-based contract manufacturer Wistron that has set up a new line for the handsets, two senior industry executives said.

[ … ]

The Cupertino-based maker of iPhones and Mac computers already makes iPhone SE since last May at the Wistron facility, which will now produce two iPhone models locally.

So far, unable to tell whether the current rumblings in (every aspect of my) life are a precursor to big breakthroughs or calm before an extremely unneeded storm.