Raj graduated with a B. Sc. in Mechanical Engineering, specializing in Manufacturing Management and Production Engineering from the University of Salford, UK.

He has 30 years’ experience in manufacturing beginning as a Management Trainee and finally as a Factory Manager with Rothmans of Pall Mall Malaysia. When the company merged to become British American Tobacco Bhd, Raj also was managing Operations Development to drive culture change in Manufacturing.

He then for 2 years was the Plant Manager for a petro-chemical plant in Port Dickson, and in 2005 worked in Autoliv Hirotako for 4 years.

Apart from being GM-Manufacturing, Raj was also the APS (Autoliv Production System) Manager. With years of lean manufacturing experience in his previous companies, Raj’s exposure to implementing APS was very much enlarged by attending the Autoliv Manufacturing Development Program at the Autoliv Academy in France and Vargada (Sweden), as well as at the APS University at Ogden, Bringham City and Tremonton in Utah, US. Apart from working and gaining insights of development in benchmark manufacturing plants in Asia- Pacific, Raj also conducted training at Autoliv sites in Korea, Thailand, China and India. He is therefore a very highly qualified APS practitioner.

Understanding the concepts of culture change and change management, plus the hands-on experience, has led Raj to the belief that APS should be treated as ‘Keep It Simple and Sweet’. Apart from providing training to other Autoliv sites in Asia Pacific, Raj has also provided lean manufacturing training to Autoliv vendors, as well as members of the Toyota Suppliers’ Club. This by itself indicates a high respect for Raj, as his training and implementation skills has been from learning from the Toyota Production System.

For the last 5 years, Raj was a Regional Industrial Excellence Champion for Nexans, a global leader in the cable manufacturing, with 96 plants worldwide. This role required a combination of high level theoretical knowledge with emphasis on being a hands-on highly skilled practitioner. The role in supporting Plant Managers in the implementation of lean initiatives covered 10 plants in Korea, China, Australia, New Zealand and Japan. He has an ability to identify opportunities, select the appropriate approach, and then train, coach and mentor people to “learn by doing”. Understands the philosophy that, use of lean tools, as a total management routine is the only way to benefit from all the lean manufacturing tools.

Throughout his career, Raj has continuously transferred knowledge and experience. His passion to train is evident when he says “What I have learnt in 10 years, you should be able to do in 1 year”.

What you will get from Raj will be complete solutions – not just individual lean tools, but a system.