The Hindu Business Line : Godrej HI CARE to invest Rs 12 cr on expansion

The two-year-old company, which was a division of Godrej Sara Lee till 2002-03, plans to take its pest management operations national, and has earmarked Rs 12 crore for expansion of its operations this fiscal.

The company is also close to finalising a technology tie-up with an Australian company, Term Guard. This alliance will make Godrej HI CARE the exclusive partner of Term Guard for the latter's anti-termite delivery system in India.

The Chief Operating Officer, Mr Vikas Hajela, said, "We believe that the market for pest management in India is highly under-leveraged. The total market size for professional pest management is estimated at Rs 200 crore, but besides us there is only one more player in the category."

He said the company broke-even last fiscal with a turnover of Rs 13 crore, and is targeting a higher growth this year.

Godrej HI CARE currently offers pest management services across eight cities - the four metros of Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai, besides Bangalore and Hyderabad in the South and Pune and Ahmedabad in the West.

Mr Hajela said that apart from the tie-up with Term Guard, Godrej HI CARE is also looking at forging at least one more such partnership for another anti-termite solution. "We are talking to various companies abroad and will soon finalise the second tie-up," he said.

On whether the company is being funded via debt, he said the Rs 12-crore investment earmarked for 2005-06 will be entirely through internal accruals.

Godrej HI CARE offers pest management solutions for pests such as cockroaches, termites, rodents, black and red ants, spiders, flies, mosquitoes, bed bugs and wood borers.

Asked if the commonly available pest control brands such as Hit, Jet and Goodnight did not eat into the sales of Godrej HI CARE, Mr Hajela said the market for over-the-counter pest control brands and professional pest control services was entirely different.

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