—
Arun Mote, Chief Executive Officer, Triveni Turbine Ltd
Triveni Turbine Ltd is a new entity formed by the demerger
of the turbine business of India's leading sugar and
engineering player, Triveni Engineering & Industries Ltd.
Arun Mote, in an exclusive interaction, discusses a wide
range of subjects beginning with Triveni's rationale in
creating a separate entity for the turbine business. Mote also
shares Triveni's vision for the new company whilst asserting
that Triveni has always seen its customer as a partner. An
interview by
Venugopal Pillai.
At the outset, please tell us about the rationale of de-merging the turbine business
of Triveni Engineering & Industries Ltd into a separate company Triveni Turbine Ltd.
Triveni Engineering & Industries is a leading sugar manufacturer in India with a
crushing capacity of over 61,000 tccpd. As part of backward integration, the
company diversified in the business of engineering, mainly in three streams-steam
turbines, gearboxes and water business.
Being a high-end technology business, steam turbine design and manufacturing
needs a different treatment in terms of managing, growing and targeting global
leadership. In the last 30 years, the turbine division has grown to a Rs.600 cr0replus
company with a market share of 60 per cent in India. Triveni is selling 130
turbines every year with around 20 per cent of revenues coming from out of India
mainly Europe, South East Asia, Africa and other regions.
In order to scale up the operations to a global level, bring technology & cost
leadership and thus have a clear edge over competition, the leadership team
decided to bring in complete focus on the business through-demerging the
business; identifying a JV partner; launching a new product range through the JV;
achieving global market reach through the JV; and brand building.
Please discuss in brief the overall growth plans of Triveni Turbines Ltd in the
medium term.
Triveni is a market leader in India with over 60 per cent market share in 1-mw to 30-
mw segment. We also have a significant presence outside India. The new joint
venture with GE will add turbines in the 30-mw to 100-mw product range. This
product range will have a global reach through GE network. All these products will
be manufactured at TTL facility. The plan is to have an accelerated organic and
inorganic growth for TTL.
What are your plans of making steam turbines (of 60 mw and
above) for the commercial power utility sector?
We supply turbines up to 30 mw through Triveni Turbine Ltd
and above in the 30-mw to 100-mw range through our JV
company GE-Triveni.
In terms of industrial clients, which segments do you regard as
your main business drivers?
Our turbines are supplied to industries like sugar, cement,
metal, IPP (commercial power plants) and to process industries
like paper, textiles, pharmaceuticals and many more.
India's power equipment industry, it is widely believed, has a
weak supply chain in terms of components and ancillaries. What
is your view?
Indian vendor base is large enough and well equipped to meet
the local demand. The industry is highly competitive and also
technologically advanced as it is dominated by global players
with their presence directly or through JV route. Even large
investments have gone in building the capacities.
Tell us more about the Triveni-GE joint venture.
The new joint venture—GE Triveni Ltd—is offering advanced
technology steam turbines in the range of above 30-100 mw for
global markets as well as India. The JV, which will benefit from
full technology transfer and ongoing R&D support from GE, will
use Triveni's Bengaluru facility for turbine manufacturing.
Chinese power generation equipment is capturing a significant
portion of the Indian market. What is your view about
competition from Chinese suppliers?
Majority of Indian consumers still look at reliable, proven and quality
suppliers who can offer service at call. These are areas where TTL
will score over any competition. We look at our customers as our
partners and hence build strong lifetime relationships through our
customer-delight programmes of services.
What is your outlook for the steam turbine industry, in terms of
both the industrial and power utilities market?
We would mainly comment on industrial segment as that is our
forte. We estimate a growth of 20 per cent in this segment.
Now having formalized Triveni's turbine business into a
separate company, what milestones would you like to see
Triveni Turbine Ltd attaining in the next 5-7 years?
Triveni is targeting global leadership in sub-100 mw segment.