Alpha Drives, a domestic manufacturer of PTOs, has emerged a front-runner in the segment, delivering products of global standard. The company has grown into a major player in the space despite stiff competition, and is on its onward march with new and innovative products to meet growing demand.
We get a business update from Mr. Suresh J. Williams, Managing Director, Alpha Drives, in a brief interaction.
Alpha Drives has been growing steadily over the years. With the industry showing signs of growth and PM’s ‘Make in India’ campaign catching up, how do you plan to address this period?
I am glad that at Alpha Drives we have a ‘PM’ through our Passion for Manufacturing! We are looking forward to a period of high growth in the industry over the next five to 10 years. We are prepared for this cyclical upturn and have invested in a modern purpose-built factory for manufacturing PTOs during the slowdown. The plant is now up and running, in time to cater to the increased volumes expected in the market.
How do you think Alpha Drives contributes to the growth of the truck hydraulics segment in the country?
The industry is maturing from manufacturing just tippers to other fully-built vehicles such as JetVac machines, compactors, cranes, etc. Customers are able to see the value of buying such vehicles from OEMs rather than procuring the chassis and then getting the structures/applications built at local body builders. This makes it easier for us because the choice of PTO is a critical one, considering the diverse range of applications in the market. For instance, a PTO which works well on a tipper may fail within a month on a crane. So, in order to systematize the choice of PTOs, we have developed and published the ALPHA PSP which is a PTO selection procedure.
How important is indigenous development of technology? Could you share details of the recent developments at Alpha Drives on the technology front?
We have established an R&D centre to design, develop and test our products rigorously. This helps us in quickly adapting our products to meet our customers’ needs. We are constantly working on improving our products and make our own old products obsolete. A case in point is the development of the G600 MPH which is a light weight PTO for the Tata G600 gearbox which is well-suited for underbody applications. We worked very closely with Wipro in developing this PTO. Our customers constantly challenge us and this motivates our team. We also bring in the best resources to improve our R&D team. We recently had a senior engineer from ZF Friedrichshafen who spent around six weeks with our team.
We believe that both for strategic and economic reasons, we should develop technology indigenously rather than rely on imports. Our engineers are among the best in the world and are capable of leading development rather than just follow the world. The importance of indigenous technology was also stressed by Dr. Saravanan, Sr. VP R&D, Ashok Leyland, at a recent industry conclave held at the Vellore Institute of Technology (VIT) in Chennai.
One of our recent launches is the PTO for the Ashok Leyland Partner. We worked closely with the Nissan-Ashok Leyland R&D team and were also ably supported by Tremec, whose transmission is used on the Partner.