TUV SUD has plan to grow seven times by 2020: Niranjan Nadkarni

Interview with CEO, TUV SUD South Asia

TUV SUD South Asia's  1100 employees provide technical quality, safety and environmental solutions to more than 5500 customers in India every day. With an in-depth understanding of the Indian market, government regulations, business relations and specific industrial trends, it provides in-house expertise, backed by strong, reputable German and global technical knowledge, for companies of all sizes. Niranjan Nadkarni CEO of TUV SUD South Asia shares his views and company plans with Hrishikesh Joshi.

Tell us something about functioning of TUV SUD South Asia?
TUV SUDSouth Asia Asia is the leading certifying, inspection and testing agency in India. With presence in all metropolitan cities like Pune, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai and New Delhi to name a few, TUV SUD South Asia has an extensive network of over 28 locations including 10 labs across India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. The company caters to a client base of over 10,000 companies. As of December 2011, TUV SUD South Asia had over 1100 staff. Its a wholly owned subsidiary of TUV SUD Group in Germany.

What is the objective of your company?
Key objectives at TUV SUD are to provide customers with solutions based on reliability, safety, quality,  environmental protection as well as cost effectiveness. Being a neutral and independent institution with activities in 70 different fields, TUV SUD is an internationally competent source for solutions in the field of auto, plant  engineering, environmental technology, food safety, textile & hard lines like toy testing, infrastructure consultancy and technical as well as soft skills training. 

Which are the prime areas or sectors where the company is focused? 
For the companies like TUV SUD, there are many business opportunities to explore. For example competent  source for solutions in the field of auto, supply chain management plant engineering, IT, infrastructure and energy.  So we believe in providing value addition to customers through services and has earned a reputation for being fair, firm, uniform and customer oriented.

What about  company's laboratory testing business? 
The company has set up many laboratories for different sectors like leather, textile, food testing and water in various locations like Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Tirupur and Ambur in Tamil Nadu.  For example, our testing lab at Ambur provides comprehensive testing capabilities ranging from physical testing, performance  and quality testing, and regulatory testing in the leather and footwear sector. We are one the leading service provider of testing, inspection and certification services associated with the leather cluster of Ambur in Tamil Nadu.

Could you brief us about company's energy audit business?
In the last few years, power or energy consumption has became very sensitive issue for government.  The electricity consumption in municipal sector is increasing steadily over the last few years. Municipal Demand Side Management (Mu DSM)  was approved as a national project for energy efficiency urban local bodies in four segments i.e. street lighting, water pumping, sewerage pumping and municipal buildings. Also we are working on a project of Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE). We are consultant for Municipal Demand Side Management (Mu DSM) programme of BEE. Our clients are Maharashtra State Power Generation Co. Ltd., Mumbai for its various Solar PV Power Projects in Dhule and Chandrapur. The basic objective of the project is to improve the overall energy efficiency of the ULBs which could lead to substantial savings in the electricity consumption, thereby resulting in cost education/savings for the ULBs.

What is the business outlook of TUV South Asia?
We started our operation in 1994 and till date we have grown a lot having a turnover close to EUR 20 million. We plan to grow seven times bigger by 2020.