LMW recommends GX spindle tapes
Elgi Ultra Industries Ltd., part of the Coimbatore-based Elgi Group, has carved a niche for itself when it comes to spindle tapes. The company, apart from spindle tapes, also manufactures transmission belts, rubber coated fabric and loom components under its ‘Elgitex’ brand. It has also its presence in areas like auto components, agro products and home appliances.
What makes the company’s spindle tapes so special is the indigenous quotient. Years of relentless research and hard toil are behind the product range, which has become a staple across the textile industry in India and several key global markets. While there has been a lot of buzz around expansion in manufacturing after the announcement of the ‘Make in India’ campaign, companies like Elgi Ultra had already set the benchmark for home-grown manufacturing excellence.
In an exclusive chat, Mr. B. Balakrishnan, Managing Director, and Mr. C. Raghu, Vice-President – Operations, gave detailed insights into the company’s core philosophy, what makes its spindle tapes stand out, the OEM tag that it has got from LMW, its sales and service network and future plans, among others.
Edited excerpts:
The story of Elgi Ultra dates to 1985 when it started off producing what was India’s first sandwich polyamide spindle tape.
Recalling the early days of the organization, Mr. Balakrishnan said: “It was the time when the country was switching over from cotton to the sandwich or synthetic tapes. We were the pioneers. We were a home-grown company. While initially we had a tie-up with a Swiss-based company, it was for a totally different product range.
Elgi Ultra has been successful in improving its offerings in spindle tapes by introducing a polyurethane-coated tape which it offers under the GX brand name. For this, the company received the prestigious India Design Mark Award from the India Design Council in 2012. It also holds a patent awarded by the Government, for its grooved spindle tape.
Asked what gives the GX tape its competitive edge, Mr. Balakrishnan stated: “We don’t sell these tapes as a commodity. While the rest look at it as one, we look at it more from a value proposition point of view. What is the value that a customer gets by buying our tapes? We look at it as application engineering. Our R&D team tries to build into the product, the requirements of the customer”.
Flexibility factor
“Another advantage that customers here get with us is that we are an Indian company. We are very flexible. We can, for example, change the design. We can offer short runs. We can change the construction of the fabric for a small run. We can do a lot of experiments and, when found successful, we can implement the same. This is the advantage of doing everything in-house. We have all the facilities available with us. We don’t depend on anyone else. If you don’t have these facilities, it leads to some serious limitations. For example, the fabric may need to be ordered from someone and that supplier may ask for a minimum order quantity. Now, since we have our own looms, we can do this inhouse. Then, of course, there are other allied strength areas like our technical prowess, widespread sales and service network and prompt aftermarket support services. All these factors add to our flexibility quotient and help us stay ahead of the competition, Mr. Balakrishnan pointed out.
Another major focus area for the company is energy savings. The GX tapes, produced with polyurethane coating, are designed to give up to 5% savings in power as compared to conventional polyamide tapes. These tapes are manufactured using special grade thermoplastic polyurethane material. This provides better performance efficiency through lesser slippage of tape. The “Pneumaflush” action provides better thermal management of tapes even at very high spindle speeds. Also, the lateral movement of the tape is avoided even at very high spindle speed.
Usage of the tapes results in reduction of slip from 2.5% in the regular polyamide tapes to 0.5% in Elgitex GX spindle tapes. The reduction in slip results in increasing the overall efficiency of the system. This also reduces the load on the motor, thus enabling lower power consumption for the same work output. All these technological advancements result in saving 2-5% of electrical energy consumed by ring spinning machines.
“Energy savings is a major cost in the spinning section, so customers get convinced. They buy the product after seeing the results. This factor also leads to positive referrals too,” Mr. Raghu pointed out.
All these advantages add to the return on investment (ROI) factor. Highlighting this fact Mr. Raghu said: “Even though the tapes may be about 2½ times more expensive than the conventional ones, the payback time is quick, about 90 days. For the rest of its life, the tape is going to add to the bottomline of the customers.”
Given the popularity of the spindle tapes, it is not surprising that several leading textile mills use them, including, Vardhman Group, Nahar Group, Trident Group, Aarti International, Arihant Spinning Mills, Arvind Group, Premier Group, Sagar Group, Sintex, Indo Count, Indo Rama and Welspun Group.
LMW recommends GX spindle tapes
Recently the GX tapes have been recommended by LMW Ltd, the largest textile machinery manufacturer in India, for use in its spinning machines. This has come as a shot in the arm for the company. Going into details about the same, Mr. Balakrishnan said: “The recommended supplier tag for spindle tapes is one more testimonial for our spindle tapes. We have worked continuously with LMW, which is another company that has led Indian manufacturing over decades and the undisputed leader in the textile machinery sector, for the last two years, to finetune the application of the product in its machines. They have tested our product in their pilot mill. In fact, several tests have been conducted over that period. After all these tests, they have recommended our GX tape.”
He added: “This ‘OEM’ tag, along with our association with other large groups, and the quantum of exports that we do, stand testimony to our standards of quality. From what used to be a few thousand, we have reached a level of supplying nearly 1.2 million tapes a year. And we are striving to add value to our customers.”
The company exports its products to several countries like South Korea, China, Vietnam, Peru, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Indonesia, Thailand, Turkey, Switzerland, Egypt, etc.
“The fact that exports contribute about 40 % of our total revenue, which everyone would agree is quite substantial, is a validation of the quality of our products by some of the most discerning clients”, he added.
Quality assurance
Speaking about the quality assurance process of the company, Mr. Raghu explained that the Elgi Ultra focus is more on process control rather than inspection control. Going into further details, Mr. Raghu said: “We are trying to bring in more and more intelligence onto the process. For example, wherever the controls are manual, we are trying to make it semi-automatic or automatic, with a built-in feedback mechanism, with some data acquisition thrown in”.
Elaborating further, he said: “Most of the process controls that we are deploying has been developed by our in-house team. Now, this is something that is not available in the market, because they are very specific to our manufacturing process. The core responsibility for developing and then process control, lies with our team. We validate everything before we put them in place to perform a process. In a way, this is another sort of R&D, which is happening parallel in process control. Further, we want the pre-dispatch inspection to be eliminated. Instead process control should take over. We are working towards achieving this”.
Robust R&D
Elgi Ultra has always been known for its strong R&D focus. According to Mr. Balakrishnan, R&D is an ongoing process at the company. “Our strength is our R&D team, which is a perfect blend of the young and experienced. While we have some people, who have been part of the system for over 25 years, we also have a good number of engineers who have around 10 years of experience too”.
Another key point to be noted is the sourcing of raw materials, which is from reputed players. “We work with the best possible suppliers. We make sure that the input quality is top notch,” Mr. Raghu added.
Currently the company has a widespread network of over 40 dealers in India and 15 at the global level.
By M.K. Prabhakar & Mohan Raj