Marathwada Auto Cluster (MAC) is a Public-Private Partnership Project (PPP) at Waluj MIDC, Aurangabad. As a PPP project, when evaluated on the parameters of “quality and cost-efficiency of a given infrastructure service to the citizen,” “model of good governance,” and “offering sound cost-benefit consistently,” MAC stands out as a shining example where private good and public good converge, and success of MAC offers hope for other sectors of the economy and public services.

Entrepreneurial mindset and spirit drive innovation. MAC is an outcome of the Vision of the local entrepreneurs. Since assets of MAC are more productive than an individual enterprise where the total cost of ownership is distributed over a higher volume of capacity utilization, it leads to value addition and building the local economy. The resources which otherwise could have been deployed in underutilized assets are freed up for the individual entrepreneur for alternative deployment.

MAC is one of the best performing clusters in the country. The role of MAC is evolving as it understands the dynamics of local business better and aligns and augments its capabilities to render relevant services.

MAC is working on a bottom-up approach considering the challenges of skilling, upskilling, and reskilling the manpower and marginal success of the top-down approach to these challenges.  MAC is planning to create “a long-term dynamic skill demand-supply intervention mechanism” with a near real-time response to the local impact of global challenges. This is expected to lead to the creation of a skill gap analysis mechanism and feeding it to the training providers to respond to the emerging challenges and opportunities appropriately.

The first step in this direction is to address the issue of lack of trainers. With support from the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE) under the program known as Skills Acquisition and Knowledge Awareness for Livelihood Promotion (SANKALP), MAC is implementing the training of trainers (TOT) program jointly with the ministry of skill development, Automotive skill development council (ASDC), GIZ, Maharashtra skill development society. The training required to become a certified instructor in robotics technology, CNC, and advanced welding technology is now available in MAC.

Supporting entrepreneurs, creating a start-up ecosystem, and collaborating with other incubators and accelerators is another initiative of MAC. MAC facilities are offered along with the MAC network is available for mentoring and business development.

MAC looks forward to serving society through these new initiatives and enlarging its role in local economic activities in a meaningful manner.