— Jaideep Jain, Director, Tesla Transformers Ltd

Tesla Transformers, headquartered in Bhopal, is a leading name in the transformer industry. It has a wide range of transformers and also generates significant business volume through exports. Jaideep Jain shares his company's future plans and also touches upon critical issues affecting the transformer industry. Setting up a transformer manufacturing plant overseas and partnering with an international player for EPC contracting jobs is on the company's growth agenda, says Jain.

Given that India is moving to EHV power transmission, do you have short-term plans of producing transformers in the 200kV-plus rating?
Currently, our focus is on standardizing our production range up to 100 MVA in 220kV class for power transformers.

Tesla produces a wide range of transformers. Apart from the power sector, which other industrial sectors are your biggest demand drivers?
As of now, the power sector happens to be the biggest business driver. The demand from the power sector is bigger than that from the industrial sector.

As we understand, Tesla was looking out for partners for execution of EPC contracting jobs. What is the current status?
Yes, we are trying to tie up with international players to be subcontractors for EHV (765kV) projects in India.

Power Grid Corporation of India has planned capex of Rs.1 trillion in the XII Plan period. How do you gauge business prospects?
We expect that the market will be depressed till 2014 and should see a pick up after that period of time.

Chinese companies have already arrived on the Indian power transformer scene. How do you their influence over the next 3-5 years?
Once these Chinese companies are in India, they are as good as any other international companies like ABB, Alstom etc. in India. In fact, it will be easier to compete with them since they will also now face local taxation etc. as any other local company.

The steel ministry has come out with a steel quality control order requiring that only BIS-certified CRGO be used in the country. What is your view?
We feel that it is a practical and right approach to take. It is only with this that that secondary/defective CRGO can be weeded out of Indian market. This will place everybody on a level-playing field.

Tell us about Tesla's export business. How much of your sales comes from exports. Do you see this proportion rising in the coming years?
Presently, around 25 per cent of our turnover comes from exports. We are already successfully exporting power and distribution transformers since 20 years to more than 25 countries worldwide. Our intention is to start a manufacturing plant outside India so as to come closer to our major customers.

Developing power transmission lines under the PPP mode appears to be an interesting vertical integration to T&D equipment manufacturers. Does this appeal to you?
Though it is a good business model, it is currently very competitive!

What policy measures would you recommend to reduce India's high failure rate of distribution transformers?
I would say that specifications of transformers must be standardized. Secondly, vendor evaluation of plants by utilities must be done so that equivalent companies are competing with each other, rather than what is happening at present. In addition, BIS certification of CRGO must also be implemented.

Please summarize your future plans for Tesla both in the transformer and EPC contracting space.
We are looking at opening regional offices in every state of India. Besides, we are planning to expand in the field of dry-type transformers and unitized substations (USS). And as said earlier, we also plan to open a manufacturing plant overseas.