To use SSAB’s expertise and garner more market share
The Chennai based Orient Impex which manufactures speciality niche products for Infrastructure and Process Industries has inked a pact on 29.02.2016 with the Stockholm based SSAB and will now be a part of the prestigious International Hardox Wear Parts Group. This will enable the Indian company to take advantage of the huge business opportunity that presents itself in the form of coal mining and infrastructure development apart from others in East and North India.
Mr. Claes löwgren, Senior Technical Advisor, SSAB EMEA AB, represented SSAB and signed the agreement which facilitates Orient Impex to get the latest, in terms of information, products, technology and advice to further explore the market in India. Mr. P.E. Ramakrishnan, Managing Partner, Orient Impex, said that, “since our products find application in speciality areas like Cement, Mining and Mineral processing, Road construction machinery, Concrete making and transportation, Coal and ash handling, Excavators, Wear liners and feeders etc, we will move into areas of North and East where huge coal mines and big infra projects are underway. Our product and expertise will save a lot of time and cost because of our speed of deliverance and understanding of the customers’ exact requirement. OI plans to use the entire range of products like tippers, buckets, crushers, dozers, shovels, chutes, feeders, screws, pavers, pulverisers, dredgers, mixers, molds, mills, cyclones, shears, balers, shredders, drums, liners, harvesters and more in its endeavour to gain acceptance in the business of coal mines, infrastructure development, etc.”
Orient Impex is focused on industries that are impacted by abrasive wear and managing it. The thrust areas identified by OI are:
- Auto components, where currently post hardening is practiced.
- Machined parts for general engineering where conventional alloy steels are used and quenched at enormous challenge with risk of rework.
- Manufactured sand that will soon replace river bed mining.
There are disparate solutions available and the one that Orient Impex are focused on is the Steel based solutions. The steel is a heat treated material with high hardness and combined with very good toughness that is a difficult combination in itself. The product is called Hardox, which is made by SSAB. The material is homogenous, rolled and water quenched steel plate, in thickness ranging from 3 mm upto 165 mm and hardness values starting from 400 BHN upwards. Orient Impex has developed a set of processes and tools to machine, drill, roll into cones or cylinders, weld Hardox into different shapes.
Orient Impex has plans to replicate the facilities of Chennai in the mining centres of Eastern India and engineering centres of Northern India and thereby double the current turnover to Rs.60 crores in the next 2 years.