Peter Tyroller turns 60: Bosch Asia Pacific Chief celebrates round birthday

Stuttgart / Shanghai – Peter Tyroller spends three thirds of the year in Asia Pacific: he travels around the region for business meetings, in Shanghai he lives in the midst of the mega city and even drives his own electro scooter. In the Bosch board of management, Peter Tyroller has an important role. The technology and services company achieved double-digit growth and reached 20.8 billion euros of sales in the past year – around 28 percent of the total sales. In the past ten years sales tripled with an annual compound growth rate of 11.8 percent. ”For 2017, we expect our sales to growth double-digit again“, says Tyroller.

Asia Pacific remains a growth region for Bosch

Asia Pacific therefore remains a significant driver of growth for the Bosch-Group. This is also reflected in its activities in the region: “For the present year, we plan investments in our Asian locations totaling some 1.2 billion euros.” Bosch is pursuing a policy of localization in the region, having already invested more than 2 billion euros in the previous two years – in total 6.8 billion euros in the past ten years. The company, which has had a presence in Asia Pacific for more than 100 years, now operates more than 60 locations in 18 countries in the region. Bosch is also an important employer in the region, employing more than 110,000 people. At present, therefore, more than one-quarter of all Bosch associates work in Asia Pacific. At 59,000, China has the lion’s share of these associates, and the largest Bosch workforce outside Germany. China is also the largest market for Bosch outside Germany.

Market for the internet of things is growing rapidly

“The market for the internet of things (IoT) is also growing rapidly in Asia Pacific,” Peter Tyroller says. “We forecast that the region as a whole will have the world’s greatest IoT market potential by 2020, at 37 percent.” According to a study, the market for the Industrial IoT in Asia Pacific alone should grow fivefold between 2015 and 2020. It is expected that urbanization and industrialization will accelerate Asian countries’ development, and connected technologies can play a part in this. As a leading supplier of Industry 4.0, Bosch offers solutions in the areas of powertrain technology and automation as well as sensor technology and software. As a leading user, the company already successfully operates pilot projects in Asia as well, at manufacturing sites in China, India, South Korea, and Malaysia. Apart from connected industry, Asian countries are above all investing in smart-city projects. Pilot projects in this area are already running in India and Singapore. In June 2017, Bosch announced a strategic partnership with the city of Tianjin in China.

Localization as the key to success

One important element of Bosch’s successful strategy is the local development of products and solutions that are tailored to each market’s requirements. Roughly 21 000 (or nearly one-third) of its research and development associates are based in Asia Pacific. In China and Singapore, they are working to create IoT solutions for the local market. And the more than 14,000 Bosch R&D associates in India make up the company’s largest R&D workforce outside Germany. These Indian engineers are developing data mining and software solutions. Since the end of 2015, Japan has been Bosch’s third development location worldwide for automated driving, and a source of valuable insights in this field.

Short CV Peter Tyroller

Peter Tyroller was born in Augsburg, Germany. In 1984 he completed his engineering studies, followed by a second course of studies in industrial engineering. Tyroller has been working at Bosch already between 1992 and 1994 as a director of the Airbag Systems Unit in Germany. He rejoined Bosch in 2000 as Executive Vice-President Sales of the Gasoline Systems division. Peter Tyroller has been a member of the board of management of Robert Bosch GmbH since 2006. Since 2013, he is responsible for coordinating activities in Asia Pacific including Australia, China, India, Japan, ASEAN countries and South Korea. You can find the complete CV here.