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The company had sold about 3,000 new grinders since the launch in Chennai market in February this year and expects to sell about 10,000 units during the current calendar year.

ULTRA PERFECT +

Coimbatore , Aug. 24

Elgi Ultra Industries Ltd (EUIL), part of the Coimbatore-based Elgi Equipments Ltd (EEL) group, wants to focus on home appliances products and on value segment , according to Dr Jairam Varadaraj, Managing Director, EEL, Coimbatore.

The company, which has come out with a new model oftable-top grinder `Ultra Perfect +', plans introduce another kitchen appliance by the end of this year or early next year, he said but would not disclose the nature of the proposed launch.

Speaking to presspersons on Wednesday at the launch of the product in Coimbatore market (the product has already been introduced in Chennai market), he said the table-top grinder first launched by Elgi more than a decade ago had carved a niche for itself in the over-crowded grinder market.

Table-top variants

The Elgi Ultra grinders had dispelled the impressionthat housewives would prefer conventional floor-grinders than the table-top variants.

He said the company had sold about 3,000 new grinders since the launch in Chennai market in February this year and expects to sell about 10,000 units during the current calendar year. The product priced Rs 6,790has a ten-year warranty.

He said the Indian consumers were willing to put value ahead of price and EUIL wanted to cater to this segment. After Coimbatore, the company plans to introduce the product in Bangalore and Hyderabad before reaching out to the North Indian markets.

Dr Varadaraj said the market for the table-top grinder was expanding rapidly and there were a lot of first-time buyers.

At a later date, the company would consider the replacement option by launching `some sort of ' buyback scheme to accelerate demand for the new product.

In the table-top grinder segment, Elgi Ultra has a 50-60 per cent market share though in the overall grinder segment, including the lower-priced floor models, its share is around 18 per cent.

It is also trying to penetrate the price-sensitive rural market.

India-specific products

The company has no plans to launch products in which international brands have a presence in India. It wanted to launch products that were unique and innovative and were India-specific, he said.

On producing dishwashers that meet Indian requirements, he said the dishwashers available now consumed lot of water and their cleaning efficiency was not very good. The models available were priced high. The company was interested in semi-automatic machines that would have some human interface also. But it was still in concept stage and it was too early to talk about launching dishwashers, he said.

More features

Mr B. Balakrishnan, Director (Operations), EUIL, said the new grinder has been designed based on customer feedback and came with a host of user friendly features such as being less noisy and requiring lesser effort at locking, was lightweight and has a timer.

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