India’s interior and modular furniture industries are at a pivotal moment. Rapid urbanisation, organised housing, and rising consumer expectations are pushing the sector beyond traditional, craft-led execution and toward more engineered, coordinated, and data-driven models of working.
To examine how tighter integration between design and manufacturing is shaping the next phase of India’s interiors and furniture ecosystem, Sourcing Hardware reached out to Autodesk — a global brand in design software solutions for the architecture, engineering, construction, manufacturing, media, education, and entertainment industries. Few companies span architecture, interiors, and manufacturing the way Autodesk does, and its tools increasingly underpin the design-to-production workflows reshaping the modular furniture market.
In this conversation, Alok Sharma, Director – AEC (India & SAARC), and Pradeepto Dey, Director – Channels (India & SAARC) discuss how India’s furniture industry is entering a
new phase of digital evolution.
How is India’s interior and modular furniture ecosystem evolving, and what signals indicate this shift?
We see India’s interior and modular furniture ecosystem undergoing rapid change. The sector is moving away from traditional carpentry toward engineered, parametric, and compliance-ready workflows. The momentum is visible — the modular kitchen market in India is projected to reach US$ 16.8B by 2030 at a 24% CAGR, while interior design services are expected to touch US$ 50B in the same year.
Customers today expect faster delivery, greater transparency, sustainable material choices, and highly immersive visualisation. These expectations are pushing the industry toward Design-and-Make workflows, where BIM tools help capture design intent and CAD/CAM enables efficient manufacturing.
By linking interior design models directly with fabrication tools — and supporting them through integrated platforms for collaboration, configuration, and digital showroom experiences — companies are able to deliver customised products with precision, speed, and consistency.
What workflow or collaboration challenges continue to hold back the industry?
The underlying issue is not just fragmented processes, but the absence of a unified data flow. Across the ecosystem, designers, vendors, and installers oscillate between BIM or CAD tools for design, spreadsheets for BOMs, and PDFs or messaging apps for execution. This creates data silos that force repeated manual entry and increase the risk of version mismatches.
For example, in fit-out projects, late-stage changes are common because the approved
Revit model is not aligned with the manufacturing drawings. This causes delays, affects
finish quality, and complicates compliance.
Future-ready businesses will be built on integrated Design-and-Make platforms that remove redundant steps, strengthen traceability, and bring predictability to schedules — all of which are essential for modular environments.
How does a connected digital foundation support interior brands as they scale?
We observe that the fastest-growing interior brands share a common trait — a digital foundation that integrates Design-and-Make processes and replaces fragmented manual
operations. Linked models keep design intent coordinated and approvals real-time, while automated BOM generation, nesting, and CNC programming reduce human error. Parametric rules and specifications strengthen compliance, and cloud-based coordination streamlines documents, RFIs, and issue tracking.
This digital shift translates into measurable outcomes. Manufacturers adopting Revit-to-
Inventor workflows report 30–40% reductions in rework, 20–25% faster delivery cycles,
and 8–12% material savings. Accurate cut-lists and clash detection also improve first-
time-right installation.
How can smarter Design-and-Make workflows help SMEs reduce waste and operate more sustainably?
Industry studies show that BIM-driven coordination and digital fabrication can reduce material waste by 10–15%, while unified Design-and-Make data flows can cut site-related issues by as much as 90%. Organisations implementing integrated workflows report similar gains — reduced rework, material savings in the 8–12% range, and delivery timelines improving by 20–25%.
For instance, ITC’s interior execution workflow using Revit, Navisworks, Assemble, and Autodesk Construction Cloud delivered major reductions in rework and material waste.
Canam Group’s integrated engineering-to-fabrication process cut site issues dramatically, while Jay & Co improved production efficiency through Revit–Inventor interoperability.
What does the rise of micro-factories and smart manufacturing mean for interiors?
Interior brands are investing in in-house production and micro-factories powered by Industry 4.0 practices such as automation, IoT, and AI. This transition — from traditional
craft-based execution to smart manufacturing — supports real-time Design-and-Make workflows, customisation, predictive insights, and data-driven decision-making. This shift enables localised manufacturing to compete globally and aligns with India’s broader Make-in-India-for-the-world ambition.
How does Autodesk’s ecosystem enable career pathways for youth without access to higher education?
We see that digital skills can significantly improve employability for underprivileged youth who may lack financial access to higher education. By offering free or low-cost access to industry-grade tools, we help lower entry barriers for skilled roles.
Vocational training centres across India use Fusion 360 to teach CNC and digital fabrication, enabling learners to enter modular manufacturing SMEs. Similarly, students trained on Revit are entering interior design and fit-out roles with stronger starting salaries. We also see workers transitioning from informal carpentry into digital design technician roles, creating more stable and professional career options.
With specialised cabinetry tools available, how does Autodesk’s ecosystem differ in scope and long-term vision?
Specialised tools perform well for specific shop-floor tasks, but they often focus on individual stages of production. Autodesk’s ecosystem spans the full lifecycle — from
design and coordination to manufacturable modelling, automated material outputs, CNC programming, and installation readiness.
Our long-term vision centres on a connected Design-to-Make-to-Operate value chain supported by cloud infrastructure, structured information management, digital twins, and AI-assisted workflows. This allows SMEs to scale without rebuilding systems as they grow.
How are Autodesk’s channel partners in India responding to these shifts?
We’ve seen a fundamental shift in how channel partners operate. Earlier, partners were largely focused on product fulfilment. Today, they are transforming into end-to-end solution providers offering design consulting, engineering expertise, workflow implementation, and lifecycle support.
This evolution is shaped by three focus areas: strengthening capabilities in BIM and cloud collaboration, expanding into manufacturing workflows and factory design, and diversifying into high-growth segments such as interiors and modular furniture. As a result, partners are developing new revenue streams through consulting, managed services, and long-term strategic engagements rather than one-time transactions.
SH View
The story of India’s modular furniture industry has often been written on shop floors and in carpentry yards. Increasingly, its next chapters are being drafted on cloud platforms, CNC machines, and connected workflows. That is where India’s design-and-make future is quietly taking shape.
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