AMCHAM members met with Ms. MaryKay Carlson, Charge d’Affaires, U.S. Embassy during her visit to Hyderabad on the 27th April at The Chambers, Taj Krishna, over breakfast. The discussion revolved around a wide range of topics, such as, visas and diversity and inclusion.

The AMCHAM Medical Devices Committee met under the Chairmanship of Mr. Prabal Chakraborty on 21st April 2017 in New Delhi to discuss the agenda to be taken up by the committee in the year 2017-18. The committee also reviewed the work undertaken by the committee during the last year — successes and misses. It was discussed and decided that the internal outreach to neighboring countries should continue. The committee also felt that it is important to keep interacting with U.S. Embassy officials and raise concerns of the medical devices industry both during visits of USG officials to India and by company representatives in Washington D.C. when any Indian government official is travelling to the U.S..

The other point of discussion including approaching state governments through any of the consulting firms and trying to get an interaction with the State Health Department through them. The committee members also suggested that the activity can be clubbed with organizing a half day training program for the regulators if the visit gets finalized.

Other members present during the meeting included representatives from Abbott, India Medtronic, GE, CR Bard, Boston Scientific, BD, Johnson & Johnson and Edwards Life Sciences. Mr. Gaurav Mendiratta was present from the AMCHAM Secretariat during the meeting.

AMCHAM’s breakfast meeting on ‘Smart Business Infrastructure – Authorised Economic Operator, Customs & Central Excise’ was held on Thursday, 20th April 2017 at Hotel Westin Velachery in Chennai. Mr. Aubrey Daniels, Regional Director – Tamil Nadu Chapter, AMCHAM chaired the meeting. The guest speakers were Mr. Santosh Dalvi, Partner – KPMG, Mr. Sunil Kumar Sinha IRS, Commissioner of Customs & AEO Program Manager and Dr. Anchita Pandoh IRS, Assistant Commissioner of Customs, AEO Program. The event was facilitated and sponsored by KPMG.

The tone for the meeting was set by Mr. Santosh Dalvi and MG Ramachandran of KPMG who mentioned that the Government of India was very keen to scale up on the World Bank’s ‘ease of doing business’ rankings and to facilitate global trade through the ‘Make in India” initiative.

Customs Commissioner, Mr. Sunil Kumar Sinha, made a presentation on the Authorised Economic Operator Program, an initiative rolled out by the World Customs Organisation with over 150 member countries presently. The U.S. has been promoting the C-TPAT for a long time, which is one layer in U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) multi-layered cargo enforcement strategy. Through this program, CBP works with the trade community to strengthen international supply chains and improve United States border security. C-TPAT is a voluntary public-private sector partnership program which recognizes that CBP can provide the highest level of cargo security only through close cooperation with the principle stakeholders of the international supply chain such as importers, carriers, consolidators, licensed customs brokers, and manufacturers.

Commissioner Sinha said customs organizations all over the world are tasked with the twin challenges of securing the borders from unlawful trade and at the same time facilitating the legitimate trade. Trade security and facilitation is one of the key determinants for the economic development of the countries. Customs, being the government organization that controls and administers the international movement of goods, is in a unique position to provide increased security to the global supply chain and to contribute to socio-economic development through revenue collection and trade facilitation.

With a view to secure the international supply chain, the World Customs Organization had in June 2005 adopted the SAFE Framework of Standards to secure and facilitate global trade. Since then, this unique international instrument has ushered in modern supply chain security standards with the help of a closer partnership between customs and business in the form of the Authorized Economic Operator (AEO) Program.

The AEO program seeks to provide tangible benefits in the form of faster customs clearances and simplified customs procedures to those business entities who offer a high degree of security guarantees in respect of their role in the supply chain. An entity with an AEO status is considered a ‘secure’ trader and a reliable trading partner. There are three tier AEO programs for importers and exporters (AEO-T1, AEO-T2, and AEO-T3). Accordingly, the AEO Program Manager may, following an application by an economic operator, issue the following Authorized Economic Operator Certification subject to scrutiny of documents for the T1 and onsite verification for the T2 Certification. Logistics providers, custodians or terminal operators, customs brokers and warehouse operators shall be provided with an AEO–LO certification, subject to scrutiny of documents and on-site physical verification.

The AEO certification has many benefits for the importer/exporter, who can take his consignment directly from the port of entry to his facility for all imports and the factory sealed container can be directly loaded on to a vessel. Customs duty can be paid twice a month for all transactions from the 1st to the 15th and 16th to the end of the month. The AEO program reduces transaction costs and improves speed of the entire transaction in a transparent manner. Each customs office has a customer relationship manager who will provide immediate solutions for all AEO certified operators.

AMCHAM India’s Supply Chain and Logistic Committee and Manufacturing Committee organized it’s annual conference on ‘Technology & Innovation – Value Chain 2025’ on Wednesday, 19th April 2017 in Mumbai. The event was powered by CGN Association India Pvt. Ltd., Rhenus Logistics India Pvt. Limited, Portrucks Equipments Pvt. Ltd., International Paper APPM Ltd. and Timken India Ltd.

The evening was a convergence of bright future-focused minds to foster learning and inspiration. The event began with opening remarks by Ms. Surabhi Wahal, Regional Director – Western Region, AMCHAM India, and was followed by remarks from Mr. Sanjay Koul, Co-Chairman – Manufacturing Committee, AMCHAM and Chairman and Managing Director, Timken India Ltd. Mr. Gregory Taevs, Principal Commercial Officer, U.S. Consulate General, Mumbai, made a special address.

Mr. Sanjay Sethi, CEO, Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC), made the keynote address with a presentation on ‘Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation – A Forward Looking Perspective’ highlighting the DNA of next generation industries, policies, infrastructure, technologies and the outcome. Some of the key highlights from the presentation included:

Economic impact of disruptive technologies by 2025
3 pillars of growth identified by MIDC to foster the rapid change:

Liveable initiatives that focus on social infrastructure and well-being
Initiatives that focus on making industry efficient and economically vibrant
Social responsibility

Snapshot of future service that will be offered by MIDC such as instrumentation and control, computing resources, data management, security and privacy, interoperability, connectivity and analytics

Mr. Subhendu Roy, Partner, AT Kearney, shared an in-depth outlook on ‘Supply Chain 2025 -Trends and Implications for India.’ Through the presentation he shared an in-depth understanding of trends that will shape the future supply chain in India 2025 namely:

More mega cities
Proliferation of segments
Improved supply chain infrastructure
Better regulatory climate
Stronger global connect
Affordable and accessible technologies

Participants of the conference received a hardcopy of AT Kearney’s study on the subject.

The first panel session of the evening moderated by Mr. Rohinton Sidhwa, Partner, Deloitte, featured an engaging discussion on ‘Innovation and Technology Enabling Manufacturing and Supply Chain’ which discussed emerging trends such as IOTs, drones, technology disruptions. The speakers included Mr. Sudhanshu Singh, Senior Vice President & Chief Operating Officer, Analytics & Research, Genpact, Mr. Ganesh Shinkre, General Manager – Sourcing, GE Transportation, India, Mr. Ramesh Kailasam, Managing Director, APCO Worldwide India Pvt. Ltd., Mr. Umesh Madhyan, National Head Infrastructure and Logistics, Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages Pvt. Ltd. and Mr. Alagu Balaraman, Partner & India MD, CGN Association India Pvt. Ltd.

A presentation was made on ‘Automation Solutions in Logistics and Supply Chain’ by Mr. S. Gopalakrishnan, Co-Founder, Portrucks Equipments Pvt. Ltd. Portrucks presented their unique solution in automation, from products to roads, which is a high density storage/sequencer and automated truck/container loader and unloader. A mini model of the system was displayed at the venue.

To understand ‘Key Trends of the Future: 2025 Business and the Human Capital’, the second panel session was moderated by Mr. Muthukumar Narayanaswamy, Senior Vice President & Whole Time Director, Meritor Inc. Automotive Axles Limited prophesized a vision of human capital 2025. The panel speakers included Mr. Shantanu Das, CHRO, Amway India, Mr. Kumar Kandaswami, Senior Director, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu India Pvt. Ltd. and Mr. Mukund Menon, HR Director, International Paper.

An engaging Q&A session answered several queries that culminated in a deeper understanding of significant perspectives to the subject.

Mr. Srinivasan Sarangapani, Chairman – Supply Chain & Logistics Committee, AMCHAM and Director Operations, Timken Engineering & Research India Pvt. Ltd concluded the successful event with closing remarks and a vote of thanks to all the participants, the eminent speakers and the event sponsors. The event was followed by networking over cocktails and dinner.

AMCHAM hosted a breakfast roundtable for Mr. Mark Linscott, Assistant USTR for South and Central Asia, U.S. Trade Representative, during his inaugural trip to India on 19th April at the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi. The meeting was focussed on the U.S. – India economic relationship and future engagement on bilateral and multilateral trade policy.

The following USG officials were also present:

Brendan Lynch, Director for India, Office of Central and South Asian Affairs, USTR
George Sibley, Acting Deputy Chief of Mission and Minister Counselor for Economic Affairs and Environment, Science and Technology, U.S. Embassy
Robert Kemp, Deputy Minister Counselor for Economic Affairs and Environment, Science and Technology, U.S. Embassy
Robyn Kessler, Principle Commercial Officer – North India, U.S. Embassy
Timothy Browning, Attorney-Advisor, Office of Policy and International Affairs, U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO)
Chad Norberg, Trade and Technology Unit Chief, U.S. Embassy
Komal Kalha, Senior Legal Counsel (Intellectual Property), USPTO, U.S. Embassy

Ms. Valerie Swope, Program Coordinator, AMCHAM made welcome remarks and introduced the USG officials. Mr. George Sibley made remarks and then turned it over to Mr. Prabal Chakraborty, Chairman – Medical Devices Committee, AMCHAM and Vice President and Managing Director, Boston Scientific India, who chaired the meeting from AMCHAM. Mr. Chakraborty gave an overview of the progress on some of the flourishing sectors and emphasized that the medical devices sector still faces price control challenges.

Mr. Linscott, in his opening remarks, mentioned that India is one of the countries that the U.S. has a trade deficit with in goods and agriculture goods. He explained that a trade report will be made on the countries with a trade deficit to determine the reasons and circumstances that led to the deficit. There will be a hearing before Congress scheduled on 18th May and the report is due out on 29th June. He said his visit to India was basically to understand and identify tariff and non-tariff barriers such as dumping practices, IPR challenges, etc. so that the necessary assessments could be made.

AMCHAM members introduced themselves and talked about specific trade barriers their companies face. Some of the challenges included high import duties on raw materials, standards and regulations, in country testing requirements, arduous tax laws, offsets challenges, export potential across sectors, product categorization inconsistencies and interpretations from port to port, etc. Mr. Gaurav Mendiratta, Sector Manager – Medical Devices, AMCHAM, gave the vote of thanks.

AMCHAM members met with for a closed door roundtable with Senator Christopher Andrew “Chris” Coons, United States Senator from Delaware (Democrat) and Senator Jeffrey Alan “Jeff” Merkley, United States Senator from Oregon (Democrat) on Tuesday, 18th April, 2017 at the U.S. Embassy. The members discussed the U.S. – India business climate and challenges and opportunities with a focus on the ease of doing business in India.