Mr. Souma Ray, Director, Haulotte India

Haulotte: “We are continually upgrading our product line with best of the technologies and safety features that ensure optimum performance. One of our recent technological advancements is Entrapment Prevention System ‘ACTIV’ Shield© Bar’ that ensures safety of the worker in an entrapment situation. Moreover, unlike some of our competitor’s offerings, the system can be reset from the platform itself, thus, saving both time and money,” says Mr. Souma Ray, Director, Haulotte India.

What is your outlook on the growth of construction equipment industry in the wake of government’s focus on infrastructure development?

With the impetus being given by the government towards Infrastructure development, we definitely are hopeful that growth in the Equipment sector shall gather pace in the years to come. Unfortunately, most of the major projects are still in the planning stage (like the Navi Mumbai International Airport, Nhava Sheva Sewri Sea Link etc.) and we are yet to see any substantial spurt in demand. But going forward, we are sure that growth in this sector shall definitely touch new highs.

Is the CE sector fully geared to usher in the GST regime from April 2017? How do you see its impact on the industry?

Rolling out the GST shall certainly have a positive impact on the CE sector, since it will do away with the differential taxation rates across various states which is a major impediment in doing business smoothly. With the unification of the tax regime, we anticipate all bottlenecks in terms of interstate sales, movement of goods to become smoother. Of course, the initial period after the rollout of GST will be challenging in terms of general understanding and handling a new taxation system. But over a period of time, it will be a win-win situation for both buyers and sellers.

There is no doubt that the market is maturing from basic equipment to more sophisticated machines; what technical improvisations is Haulotte doing to its existing products offering?

At Haulotte, our R&D team is working relentlessly to incorporate the best safety features in our machines so as to make them safe as well as give optimum performance. One of the recent technological advancements we have introduced in our diesel boom lifts is the Entrapment Prevention System, ACTIV’ Shield© Bar. We exhibited the same on our HA16RTJ Articulating boom in bC India exhibition in Delhi. This system can be factory fitted in new machines when ordered along with it, and also retrofitted at site for older Haulotte machines already in service with our customers.

This is a secondary guarding system that ensures safety of the worker in an entrapment situation. The system once activated allows reverse and down function of the machine, thus preventing further danger to the worker. The system, unlike some of our competitor’s offerings, can be reset from the platform itself, thus saving both time and money.

We are also continually introducing state-of-the-art model upgrades/ new launches across our product line. Such machines incorporate the best of the technologies available in the world and also have the best safety features, are user-friendly, and ensure optimum performance.

Strong after-sales service and spare parts availability are also becoming one of the key selling points. How is your company strengthening its positions in these areas?

Haulotte Group strategy is driven by “Customer Proximity”. This involves the establishment of a commercial & services network closer to our customers, with teams of professionals who understand the needs and expectations of our customers and provide support and service to them.

At Haulotte, the end-users are serviced by our pan India distributor (Gemini Power Hydraulics Pvt. Ltd.). They have a team of Service Engineers stationed at different locations of India. Haulotte India constantly works in training the GEMINI service team to upgrade their intervention capabilities and keeps them abreast of the changing technologies. All rental companies are catered directly by us for their requirements of spare parts & service. We have a technical hotline that is available 24X7 to provide technical assistance to all our customers in India and other SAARC countries.

What would be the company’s focus during its participation at bauma Conexpo India 2016?

We have been participating in Bauma India since the first instance in 2011. Like previous years, this year too we shall be at Bauma Conexpo 2016 at HUDA grounds, Gurgaon. We are located at Outdoor Stall no- 840.

Our focus this year would be exhibiting our new range of products encasing the best technology in the world, with specific emphasis on showcasing Telehandlers.

What are the products and services to be launched/displayed at the show? Kindly highlight the USP of one of your newly introduced products.

We will be exhibiting our latest generation of Rough Terrain Articulated Boom, Vertical Mast, Electric Scissor and Telehandler. Each variant has its own USP, but one of the many distinguishing notable features is in the lower ground control Box of our articulating boom. We have incorporated the Haulotte Diagnostic screen in the panel which will enable the user to get all details of performance and related parameter at the touch of a button. Further, any fault diagnosis can also be done on this screen, which gives a pictorial description of the nature and location of the fault. This tremendously helps in reducing the downtime of the machine and any intervention can be done in the shortest possible time.