BPL plans to manufacture cellphone batteries

BPL, the Bangalore-based Rs 120 crore consumer electronics firm, is expected to foray into manufacturing of mobile phone batteries.

According to information available, the project details are being finalised and production is expected to go on stream by mid-2008. The company preferred not to comment on the development.

This is one of the areas on which the company will rely to stage a revival. During the late 1990s, BPL had a turnover of around Rs 1,500 crore and was the market leader in the colour television market in India.

The company took on a lot of debt to be an end-to-end player - from sourcing raw materials to servicing consumers. The move, however, did not yield results, after Korean consumer electronics firms such as LG and Samsung began their onslaught on the Indian market.

In its foray into the cellphone battery market, BPL is expected to use the alkaline battery manufacturing plant it has at Dobbespet, a town situated north of Bangalore on National Highway 7.

Early this year, BPL hived off the battery business into a 50:50 joint venture with Australia's FTA to develop it. The deal fetched BPL close to Rs 40 crore.

Sources indicate that FTA trades commodities such as nickel, zinc and silver and its compounds, which are used to make mobile phone batteries. They also said that BPL is in talks with Nokia to supply batteries to its manufacturing plant in Chennai.

Currently, BPL has the capacity to churn out 10 million alkaline batteries a year and has been a major OEM exporter to global brands such as Kodak and Sanyo.

While, BPL is planning to foray into the mobile phone battery business, the company is already present in the mobile handset market. In 2007, BPL sold handsets in Kerala, Tamil Nadu and in some parts of Karnataka.

According to sources in the company, BPL has the capacity to produce around 25,000 handsets every month at its production unit on Old Madras Road, north-east of Bangalore.

For this unit, BPL has signed pacts for sourcing technology and components with global firms such as Texas Instruments, Spansion, Amphenol, Murata, Samsung, Anadigics, Rohm and Flextronics.

In addition, BPL is expanding its healthcare equipment business. Last year, BPL hived off its colour television business into an equal joint venture with Sanyo.