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Tata Motors taps Martin Uhlarik as new global design head
NEW DELHI: Indian automaker Tata Motors has tapped Martin Uhlarik as its new global design head. The announcement comes in the wake of his predecessor Pratap Bose’s decision to step down.
At present, it is unclear where Bose, who has been with the company for 14 long years, is headed to. He was instrumental in transforming the design language for all of Tata Motors Vehicles, some of which have gone on to win design awards over their lifetimes.
Previously, Uhlarik was working as the head of design for Tata Motors European Technical Centre (TMETC). A 27-year career veteran, he had joined Tata Motors back in 2016 as the head of design in the UK. He is also credited with the development of the Impact 3 generation of vehicles.
Uhlarik will continue to operate from TMETC in the UK, where he will lead teams in the three Tata Motors design centres in Coventry (UK), Turin (Italy) and Pune (India). He will report into Tata Motors president – passenger vehicle business unit Shailesh Chandra.
Tata Motors CEO & managing director Guenter Butschek said, “I am delighted to announce the appointment of Martin Uhlarik as the new global design head of Tata Motors. Martin is an experienced automobile designer with deep domain knowledge of design, keen understanding of international trends and extensive operational experience with leading automobile companies in several geographies. His rich experience and expertise will inspire our teams to further enhance our vehicle design philosophy and language. I take this opportunity to also thank Pratap for his services and wish him the best for the future.”
Uhlarik has a degree in industrial design from the Ontario College of Art and Design University in Toronto, Canada and a degree in Transportation Design from Art Center College of Design in Vevey, Switzerland.
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Samsung certifies 1,000 Maharashtra students in AI and coding
The South Korean electronics giant marks its first large-scale skilling push in the state, with women making up nearly half the national programme’s enrolment
PUNE: Samsung has put 1,000 students in Maharashtra through a certified training programme in artificial intelligence and coding, the largest such drive the South Korean electronics company has run in the state and a signal that corporate India’s skilling ambitions are moving well beyond the boardroom brochure.
The certifications were awarded under Samsung Innovation Campus (SIC), the company’s flagship corporate social responsibility programme, which launched in India in 2022 with the stated aim of democratising access to future-technology education. The 1,000 graduates were drawn from four institutions: 127 from Savitribai Phule Pune University, 373 from Pimpri Chinchwad University, 250 from D.Y. Patil University’s Ramrao Adik Institute of Technology and 250 from Anjuman-I-Islam’s Kalsekar Technical Campus. All completed training in either AI or coding and programming, the two disciplines Samsung has identified as the critical pillars of the digital economy.
The programme does not stop at technical training. Soft-skills development and career-readiness modules are baked into the curriculum, a deliberate attempt to close the gap between what universities teach and what employers actually want.
“India’s digital growth story will ultimately be shaped by the quality of its talent pipeline,” said Shubham Mukherjee, head of CSR and corporate communications at Samsung Southwest Asia. “As technologies like AI move from the periphery to the core of industries, skilling must evolve from basic training to building real-world capability. This milestone in Maharashtra reflects how industry and academia can come together to create a future-ready workforce that is both globally competitive and locally relevant.”
The Maharashtra drive sits within a rapidly scaling national effort. Samsung Innovation Campus trained 20,000 young people across India in 2025, hitting its stated target for the year. Women account for 48 per cent of national enrolments, a figure the company cites as evidence of its push for an inclusive technology ecosystem. The programme is implemented in partnership with the Electronics Sector Skills Council of India and the Telecom Sector Skill Council.
Samsung, which is marking 30 years in India this year, runs SIC alongside two other initiatives, Samsung Solve for Tomorrow and Samsung DOST, as part of a broader effort to build what it calls a generation of innovators with both the technical depth and the problem-solving mindset to thrive in a fast-moving digital world.
A thousand certified students is a tidy headline. Whether they find jobs that match their new skills is the harder question, and the one that will ultimately determine whether corporate skilling programmes like this one are genuine pipelines or well-photographed gestures.
