Tata Consultancy Services has launched a new industrial automation lab in Pune designed to demonstrate how artificial intelligence, robotics and digital twins can enable manufacturing operations to function with minimal human intervention.
The TCS Industrial Autonomy & Engineering Lab, called the Lights-Out Factory, is located at the company's Sahyadri Park campus. TCS describes it as India's first lights-out factory lab, a claim that has also been reported by industry publications. The facility is intended to provide manufacturers with a controlled environment to test autonomous production technologies before deploying them in operational factories.
At the centre of the lab is a fully robotic battery pack assembly line covering multiple stages of production. The setup combines industrial AI, robotics, digital twins, factory control systems and real-time operational intelligence to simulate a self-optimising manufacturing environment.
The lab uses TCS' Human+AI Service Autonomy Model to demonstrate how companies can progress from digitally enabled operations towards more autonomous production systems. Manufacturers will be able to prototype, validate and assess AI-led manufacturing scenarios before implementing them at scale.
TCS said the facility will support applications including predictive maintenance, automated quality inspection, real-time process optimisation, human-machine collaboration and autonomous factory operations.
Digital twins will allow manufacturers to create virtual representations of industrial environments and test scenarios before making changes to physical production systems. Vision AI and robotics can support machine perception and adaptive workflows, while sensor-to-cloud capabilities are intended to connect factory-floor data with edge and cloud platforms for real-time decision-making.
The Pune facility is also designed to address the gap between experimenting with Industry 4.0 technologies and applying them in live production environments. By providing a working industrial setup, TCS aims to allow customers to evaluate technologies and potential operating models while reducing deployment risks.
The launch expands TCS' industrial autonomy and engineering infrastructure in India. Earlier this year, the company opened an Industrial Autonomy & Engineering Lab powered by Nvidia in Bengaluru, focused on physical AI applications across industrial and mobility use cases.
Sreenivasa Chakravarti, Global Head and Vice President of Industrial Autonomy and Engineering at TCS, said the new facility is intended to help enterprises move from digitally enabled manufacturing towards increasingly autonomous production.
The Pune lab comes as manufacturers explore AI not only for individual automation tasks but also for connecting engineering, production and factory operations. TCS is positioning the facility as a testing ground for enterprises evaluating how AI-first manufacturing systems can be introduced into existing industrial environments.
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