Know our Coimbatore - part 3 Industrial Revolutions.

I like to bring out more informations about our one of the leading Industry known as :

Premier Instruments and Controls Ltd., popularly known as Pricol.

It produces much of all the precision components for the automotive industry - passenger car, two-wheeler, tractor, commercial vehicle - and for the Ministry of Defence.

Since its inception over two decades ago, Pricol has focussed on developing products independently.

All its products - oil pumps, electronic counters and controls, products for defence needs, industrial pressure gauges, disc brakes for two-wheelers, gears, sprockets, oil-level sensors or valves - have been developed in-house.

Product quality and the company's ability to respond to change with innovative solutions have attracted over a dozen international companies as its customers.


According to Pricol chairman and managing director Vijay Mohan, liberalisation and intense competition among vehicle manufacturers have prompted auto component manufacturers to improve manufacturing processes and productivity and to cut costs.

The component-manufacturing industry is in a position to export quality products.

At present we have a partial strike in PRICOL due to labour unrest and efforts are on to sort out this issue at the earliest.


Another auto component link for Coimbatore is provided by L.G. Balakrishnan & Co, founded by the late L.R.G. Naidu in 1960 to make timing chains for two-wheelers.

Its `Rolon' brand has a 65 per cent share of the market.
The company has several manufacturing units, all ISO 9001 certified.
The company also makes transmission chains, sprockets, tensioners, cogged belts and rubber products, mainly for two-wheelers.
The company holds over 40 per cent of the market for industrial chains.
LGB exports to over 10 countries and has exclusive distributors in most of these destinations to liaise with foreign customers.


Coimbatore's industrial revolution began with pumps and even today it is the main source of pump supply to much of India; 60 per cent of the country's requirement of pumps is met by Coimbatore.

Fisher Pumps Private Limited(part of the Sharp Tool group, started by K.K. Ramaswamy in 1967) is the largest producer of domestic pumps in the country.

The company produces over 40 types of pumps, including mini-mono-blocks, centrifugal submersibles, and jet and special pumps for open wells.

The company `pumps out' new products every year.
Fisher pumps are sold all over India as also in Dubai, Muscat and Sri Lanka.


Suguna Pumps, started in 1958 by Sri.C.G. Ramaswamy, began with electric motors and then diversified into pumps.
Half its products are aimed at the domestic use sector, followed by agriculture (35 per cent).
The 90-crore company has a separate R&D division which focusses on efficiency, design (to decrease weight) and materials management (to decrease cost and corrosion).
The company has two foundries for its own use.
According to managing director V. Lakshminarayanaswamy, while the company exported 50,000 motors last year, it plans to double the figure this year. Increasing cost due to a rise in steel and copper prices without increase in pump price has dwindled margins.
Thus a lot of R&D effort, according to Lakshminarayanaswamy, is being concentrated on material substitutes.


Another major player in the pump industry is AquaSub Engineering, which makes the Texmo brand of domestic and jet pumps and borewells and submersibles.
Also popular are the Aquatex brand of agricultural mono-block pumps, open-well submersibles and electric motors.
The company also has an international brand called `Atx'.
AquaSub has bagged the national export award in the last four years.


With over 650 models and 750 dealers, everything is in-house at AquaSub - from R&D to casting to motor stamping.
According to general manager V. Krishna Kumar, the drought-like situation across the country is bound to generate good demand for submersible pumps. "But the heavy excise, sales and customs duties make Indian pumps non-competitive in the international market," he says.
This apart, over 60 per cent of the demand for pumps is catered to by the unorganised sector, which is out of the tax net and hence is able to cut costs.
According to him, as the company is into making water pumps and not industrial pumps, it managed to survive the last recession.

All of you would have heard an another household name allover the Globe as CRI Pumps,
from the concept of "Commitment, Reliability, Innovation"known asCRI.
This company started in the year 1961 and one of the pioneers to produce 100 % Stainless steel Pumps of ISO standards Multistage centrifugal, deepwell submersible, and pheripheral pumps of 7,50,000 per annum.
These pumps are being sold in domestic and export markets
(Be it for agriculture, Industry, Domestic, Mining or Civil applications )

Rest in Next....Part 4.....

Subbu