Our Future Plan is to Manufacture Skids, Intervalve Poonawalla Ltd

Intervalve Poonawalla Limited and El-O-Matic India have been taking giant strides in the sector of valves and actuators. In this interview with Huned Contractor, Yohan Poonawalla, chairman and managing director of both these companies elaborates about products, expansion plans and the growth potential of the industry

Pune-based Poonawalla Group is one of India’s most respected and leading business houses with interests in the sectors of engineering, biotech, thoroughbred horse breeding, hospitality, finance and real estate. Of their various companies, Intervalve Poonawalla Limited and El-O-Matic India are engaged in the engineering sector for the production of world-class valves and actuators, providing reliable flow-control solutions to a wide spectrum of industries worldwide spanning over 46 countries and with an impressive track record of supplying to various industry sectors like oil and gas, petrochemical, power (nuclear, thermal, hydro), chemicals, agrochemicals, steel, paper and pulp, fertilizer, edible oil, pharmaceuticals, paint, tyre, water treatment, effluent treatment, utilities, food and beverages, and so on. Excerpts from the interview:

Q. Could you elaborate about the operations of Intervalve Poonawalla Limited and El-O-Matic India?

The current manufacturing programme of Intervalve Poonawalla Limited includes butterfly valves produced in technical collaboration with BV Holland (variants: soft-seated/metal-seated, centric, eccentric, replaceable liner/moulded liner). We also manufacture gate valves, globe valves, check valves (variants: wafer/DPCV/swing/piston), ball valves (variants: floating/trunnion, soft-seated/metal-seated) and Skotch yolk actuators. The size range starts from 1/2” up to 112”.

El-O-Matic India was established in 1989 in collaboration with El-O-Matic International, Holland which was subsequently acquired by the Emerson Group. El-O-Matic India (P) Ltd. is synonymous with safety and high efficiency. El-O-Matic India manufactures pneumatic actuators in both single acting and double acting variants. Along with manufacturing and selling of bare actuators, we are also an experienced and qualified system integrator delivering the entire on/off valve systems comprising valve, actuator, solenoid valve, limit switch, tubing, positioner and similar components since valves and actuators are our in-house products. Our actuators are suitable for over half a million operations.

Q. What is the infrastructure status of the company and its manufacturing capacity?

The Poonawalla Group of engineering companies has three world-class state-of-the-art manufacturing facilities in Pune that are spread across 15 acres. These companies have the latest machinery and equipment, including facilities to manufacture valves up to 112”. This includes in-house facilities for special testing like Helium leak test, fire-safe test, proof of design test, cyclic test, non-destructive test, etc. We inaugurated a new facility in May 2017 to focus on manufacturing of metal-seated ball valves for petrochemical industries and refineries and the product portfolio includes large-sized ball valves up to 42” and handling weights up to 20 tons.

Q. What is the product(s) USP that gives Intervalve an edge in the industry?

Intervalve Poonawalla Limited is committed to maximizing customer satisfaction by consistently improving the quality of its products, services and delivery. We strive for the growth of our clients, employees, society and all our associates with passion, perfection and performance: the passion to maintain leadership in everything we do, perfection in what we promise and performance in what we produce. Our consistent endeavour is to exceed our customer expectations in our brand and products. Our engineering companies have been associated with the manufacturing of high-quality products with total customer satisfaction. The companies have always emphasized on investing in the right assets to deliver value.

The butterfly valves of Intervalve Poonawalla Limited are designed as per international standards and benefit from a technical collaboration with B V Holland. They have been tried, tested and proven for the last 30 years. El-O-Matic’s actuators have the advantage of a technical collaboration with El-O-Matic, Holland. The company has also been manufacturing ball valves and gate, globe and check valves for the last 10 years and has supplied to industries across all sectors like chemicals, water, steel, oil and gas, fertilizers, petrochemicals, food and beverages, power, and so on.

Both the companies have wide range of approvals from end users like EIL, IOCL, BPCL, HPCL, APGENCO, GE, Reliance, Larsen & Toubro, Essar Group, Adani Group, VaTech Wabag, BGR Group, United Phosphorus, Cipla, Asian Paints, Henkel, Tata Steel, Jindal Group, ITC and certifications of various international standards like IBR, API, ISO, OHSAS, CE, ATEX, PED, etc. With this product portfolio that is manufactured under one umbrella, the company has positioned itself as a one-stop solution and single source responsibility, as for example, valves and actuators under a single source for automated systems. And as mentioned earlier, this is our unique selling proposition (USP) that translates into tangible benefits for our esteemed customers.

Q. What kind of research and development is carried out?

We have a strong and highly qualified team in our engineering and research and development departments. This team ensures compliance to all international designs of our products and undertakes lot of development activities. Design validations and prototyping are carried out before the release of the final manufacturing design, which ensures ruggedness of our in-house designs. We use the latest design software like ProEngineer and Solidworks. Our design team is flexible and capable of customisation as per the requirement of our customers.

Q. What is the company’s expansion plan for 2017-18?

The company has decided to expand its manufacturing base as it intends to add new products like metal-seated ball valves for petrochemicals and refinery, large-sized ball valves up to 42”, cryogenic ball valves, gate globe check valves and a world-class assembly and testing plant for valves. These products would address a wider range of products coupled with system integration with actuators for greater automation that will make us a ‘single-stop’ solution provider and more so ‘single source responsibility’ for our existing and new customer base.

Q. What about exports?

Currently Intervalve Poonawalla Limited is exporting to 46 countries with a focus on countries in the Southeast Asian region, the Middle Eastern region, the European continent and the American continent. The company is trying to expand its network to the Far East region and Africa.

Q. What is your perception about the Indian valve market? Will it accelerate? If so, what would be the driving factors?

The Indian valve market would outpace the growth of the world valve market, which is growing at 5% per annum. The Indian government’s ‘Make in India’ campaign has triggered investments coupled with opportunities in infrastructure development projects and this, among others, will be the key growth driver for the Indian valve industry. The ‘Smart Cities’ project is another growth driver for the valve industry in India. In addition, opportunities in the oil and gas industry in GCC countries, rising demand for energy in APAC and major investments in the African continent will be the other growth drivers for the Indian valve industry.

Q. What are the opportunities that the company would like to tap in the coming future?

Our future plan is to manufacture skids for the industrial and natural gas segments. Skids are an integration of valves, actuators and electronic accessories. Skids of three types would be manufactured: pressure-reducing skids, gas conditioning skids and gas metering skids. This would have many of our in-house products such as butterfly valves, ball valves, gate, globe and check valves and actuators.

Q. What are your activities in terms of corporate social responsibilities?

The Poonawalla Group is engaged in several CSR activities. We have received many accolades and recognition from government bodies and NGOs for our contribution and continued association towards social causes. Be it medical aid or education for the underprivileged, developing gardens for the beautification of Pune or its basic infrastructure, we strive to put in our best to support all possible social endeavours. For instance, Intervalve Poonawalla Limited has been associated with the Poona Leprosy Committee since 1990 and has been instrumental in almost eradicating the disease.

The Poonawalla Group has financially supported the Zavaray Poonawalla Cancer Building at the Ruby Hall Hospital. Apart from beatifying and maintaining the Gool Poonawalla Garden we sponsored and took active participation in the construction of the Soli Poonawalla Road at Hadapsar in Pune. We are also committed to supporting better education for the underprivileged through promoting English medium education at the Soli Poonawalla Memorial High School at Hadapsar.