• Investment World
• eWorld
• Catalyst
• Mentor
• Life
• Canvas
• Praxis
• Urban Pulse
• Brand Quest

Stocks

• Quotes
• SE Diary
• Scoreboard
• Open-End Mutual Fund

Cross Currency

• Rates
  
  

Shipping

• Ports
  
  

Archives

• Yesterday
• Datewise
• Resources

Group Sites

• The Hindu
• Business Line
• Sportstar
• Frontline
• The Hindu eBooks
• The Hindu Images

Sriram Srinivasan

Chennai , May 27

RELIABILITY and low cost have for long been the selling points of fire-fighting equipment. Now here's a product that neither harps on the traditional mantra of reliability nor comes cheap.

It wants to treat the former as a given, and ride high on the strength of its technology despite its design not adhering to Bureau of Indian Standards' norms (though "its performance does").

Saffire, which distributes the products of Germany's Advanced Firefighting Technology Gmbh (AFT) in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, reckons the highlight of its fire extinguishers to be efficiency in the use of water, the absence of which could worsen the extent of damage during fire accidents.

Mr M.S. Sriram, Regional Manager of Saffire, quoting a study of researchers, said that only 30 per cent of the damage in a fire accident is caused by fire; the rest is caused by fire-fighting!

He claimed that his company's product releases water droplets of optimum sizes through a 2-kg gun, which "provides maximum fire extinguishing power".

Optimum-sized droplets deal more efficiently with fire than spurts of water do; they also create more steam, thus cutting off oxygen supply, he added.

Further, the product is said to be lighter than conventional equipment and is mobile too.

But at Rs 3.2 lakh for the basic six-litre model, the product is far from cheap.

Mr Sriram conceded that the price was high but said that it could be less expensive if not for the high rate of Customs duty.

That concern is likely to be taken care of, at least partly, when AFT sets up a manufacturing facility, initially as an assembly unit, in Bangalore later this year.

The Bangalore office will also be in charge of the West Asian and South Asian markets.

More Stories on : Channels and Franchises

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page

Stories in this Section
Boots Piramal working to retain visibility

Copyright © 2004, The Hindu Business Line. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu Business Line