Ajax Fiori’s New Generation ‘Agro’ Series on Display at Excon 2013

"To keep pace with current and future requirements and to meet the demands of accuracy, Ajax Fiori will showcase its New Generation "Argo" series of mixers with the new "Concrete Batch Controller" and other superior technical attributes at Excon 2013. Our focus is to streamline our business operations to have proper focus on Batching Plants wherein we shall be opening a new factory exclusively for manufacturing batching plants. We have also entered into collaboration with a major Concrete Pump manufacturer to manufacture and distribute their range of Concrete Pumps, Boom Pumps, Line Pumps, and Placer Booms, in India," apprises Mr. Debasis Bhattacharya, Head- Sales and Marketing, Ajax Fiori, in an interview with Maria R.

From time-to-time, Ajax Fiori has been adding new products to its basket and upgrading its offerings. The latest being upgrading of the existing series of Self-loading Concrete Mixers and Self-loading Articulated Site Dumpers. What are the important technical attributes of these additions and how have the market responses been so far?

We, at Ajax Fiori, understand the needs of the customer and deliver cost-effective and value added solutions to all end-users. Our "Argo" series of Self-loading Concrete Mixers have attained unprecedented growth, thanks to its productivity, mobility, and labour savings feature. The demand from varied application sectors and semi-urban geographies has propelled the "Argos" to be positioned as a combined Mobile Batching Plant cum Transit Mixer for small to medium concrete requirements.


To keep pace with current and future requirements, and meet the demands of accuracy, Ajax Fiori is now pleased to showcase the New Generation "Argo" series of mixers with the new "Concrete Batch Controller" with the following technical attributes:

• Batching of up to 7 defined aggregates
• Water batching by electromagnetic pulse meter in auto and manual mode
• Additive batching by electromagnetic pulse meter in auto and manual mode
• 8 bit, 128 KB Microcontroller with LCD display
• Integrated adjustable real time clock.
• 12 Tact-tile multifunction keys with numeric (0-9) and function keys
• External interface for data downloading on to a computerised database
• Printer connection through RS 232 port
• Calibration & Tare function
• Printout of daily reports, periodical reports, batch reports, and consumption reports
• Record of batching data along with batch ID, machine ID and real time basis
• Storage facility of data for at least 500 batches
• Setting of mixing time with alarms
• User-friendly operator interface
• Diagnostic test screen for trouble- shooting
• Error display and fault alarms

These new initiatives are appreciated well by Contractors wherein their Client insist for Batch reports for every concrete pour.

What is the impact of fall of rupee on the company, since in the manufacturing of your products, the company may be using a number of imported components?

The appreciation of Euro almost to the extent of 20-25% has had a substantial impact on the costing of our SLCMs, since value wise almost 50% of the components used for manufacture are imported. We have to a large extent borne this impact; however, over the period; it is being increasing difficulties for us to sustain the same pricing levels of our products.

What is the system placed in the company to have an effective dealership arrangement to facilitate products distribution and initiative taken to develop a strong vendor base?

We strongly believe in reaching out to the customers directly and hence we have our own network of sales and product support engineers spread throughout India. All our products are distributed from our two manufacturing units near Bangalore. We are presently having seven regional/area offices, five warehouses and one workshop-cum-training centre. Over the next year, we intend to have another three warehouses and two workshop-cum-training centres. This apart, we have our widespread team of resident engineers stationed in all major states in India. Today, we have over 50% of our employee strength directly on to customer interface.

Markets, it is said need greasing during dull phase. They bring in the desired results once they take off. What are company's current marketing initiatives to dispel present pessimism in the market place within the company and outside?

We have been witnessing the dull phase since June this year due to a combination of factors like rise in project costs due to delays, increase in interest rates, early advent of monsoons and the tight money position in the market. During such phase, our focus is on cost optimization and effective utilization of resources. We have been working closely with our customers to ensure that their machine utilization is at optimum levels. We have also been offering attractive financial package to ensure that our customers get a better deal even in such difficult times.

Summer has seen a dull market phase for CE sector. The winter could be harsher. The spring time next year could bring in some cheers, say the analysts. What is Ajax Fiori's assessment of the market as normalcy sets in?

The infrastructure industry has matured a lot over the last couple of decades and by this time we all know that there will be downturns in the economy. It is for us to gear up in such phase and take all the smart steps to ensure that we reap benefits when there is a turnaround in the industry. We have had a very good summer, wherein during first quarter of FY 13, we registered a 20% growth over last year. The monsoon period has been quite flat for us, but we anticipate registering growth even during the winter and beyond.

At Ajax Fiori, we cater to multiple application sectors, semi-urban geographies and different customer segments which ensure our vast exposure in the market and enable us to deliver decent business results even during such dull phase.

What are the company's plans to participate effectively in the CE mega event - Excon 2013 - to be held in Bangalore during November, this year? What are the new products and services expected to be unveiled here. Do you think that Excon-2013 will pep up the CE market?

Excon has always been one of our flagship promotional events and Excon 2013 shall be our mega event. We have been going through a branding exercise over the last six months and we shall be showcasing our refreshed brand identity during Excon. We have always been a very strong player in the concrete equipment market, but we also understood that we had a few product gaps which we needed to address. Internally, we streamlined our business operations to have proper focus on Batching Plants wherein we shall be opening a new factory exclusively for manufacturing batching plants. We have also entered into collaboration with a major Concrete Pump manufacturer to manufacture and distribute their range of Concrete Pumps, Boom Pumps, Line Pumps and Placer Booms, in India. Excon 2013 will witness our refocused approach to Batching plants and the launch of our Concrete Pumps.