The Hindu Business Line : Ucal Fuel to treble engineering headcount; expand product range

Ucal manufactures carburettors, air suction valves for two-wheelers and fuel injection components for cars. Carburettors, which mix air and fuel and let the mixture into the engine, are going out of use partly because of the advent of fuel injection technology.

The Ucal Fuel Systems Managing Director, Mr S. Jayakar, expects that carburettors will fade away by 2008-09. It was in anticipation of this eventuality that the company took up air suction valves and fuel injection components in the last few years.

Now the company intends to expand its product range. The first step is to find out what products to take up for manufacture. To look into this, Ucal Fuel decided last year to set up an R&D centre. The centre would partly look into the new product development and partly do R&D work for the company's Japanese collaborator, Mikuni.

Now, the centre has come up. The company has spent Rs 8 crore, out of the total budget of Rs 20 crore, on the project. The rest of the outlay would be spent this year, mostly on buying equipment, Mr Jayakar told Business Line on Tuesday. Towards strengthening its R&D team, the company has decided to hire at least 50 engineers.

Mr Jayakar said that Ucal Fuel would become a multi-product company, though all its products would come under the rubric of `fuel management systems.'

"The idea is that each product should generate revenues of about Rs 200 crore," he said.

Ucal Fuel's turnover in 2003-04 was Rs 260 crore, most of it came from carburettors. Asked how the company would manage multiple products in the future, with each product being quite significant in terms of contribution to revenues, Mr Jayakar said, "I don't think it is such a hard thing to achieve."

Meanwhile, Ucal Fuel's technical tie-up with Orbital Engine Corporation of Australia has tasted success. Ucal has received an order from Bajaj for the supply of direct engine components for its three-wheelers. The order, which is more in the nature of a trial order, would be a "test case" for the application of Orbital technology in India, Mr Jayakar said.

The `direct injection' technology from Orbital, it is said, can enable a two-stroke engine deliver the same fuel economy as a four-stroke engine, without sacrificing power.

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