GEA Westfalia Separator Opens Bangalore Production Facility

Report by Santanu Ganguly, Bangalore: A 6 billion euro conglomerate GEA Group, known as the largest system provider of Machines and Process Technologies Worldwide and market leaders in the Food and Energy Sectors, inaugurated its new facility in Bangalore.

This new state of the art facility was inaugurated by Mr Markus Hullmann, President of GEA Mechanical Equipment and member designate GEA Executive Board. Speaking at the occasion Mr Hullmann brought to light-“Whether you drink beer, wine, juices or milk, use edible oils for your food or whether you take antibiotics against inflammations, vitamins as food supplements or walk into a restaurant for dinner, or you use mineral oils, chances are good that our machines have been involved in the production process of all these products. With over 2500 applications that GEA offers worldwide most are now available in India”.

Initially GEA Westfalia Separator a high technology company operated in highly selected and niche areas of the Indian industry which was limited to certain Chemical/Pharma applications and Casein plants where there was limited competition. In due course, the economy opened up, custom duty tariffs came down – which led to a larger canvass that made in-roads in most of the application areas.

As of today, GEA continues to provide innovative solutions to the customers and have penetrated in markets for many standard applications. Food, Pharma and Energy remain the main focus areas. Antibiotic Projects, Dairy including Casein Projects, Naphtha Treatment Projects, Vaccine Projects, Fruit juice, Instant Coffee, Edible Oil Projects are areas where the company is active in India.

Speaking on the occasion Mr. Markus Hullmann said, “India is a diverse country with various religions, languages, income levels. India’s growth has accelerated since mid 90‘s, and the country has grown at 5%-6% consistently for the past 17 years. The growth has been driven by a sustained reform agenda pursued by successive governments. In addition, investment goes a longer way in India due to high capital efficiency. India has sufficient financial resources for growth. Consumer spending is already growing at a rate of 8%CAGR driven by an emerging middle class that has created a large market“

He further added, “In addition to services, manufacturing is also growing swiftly at 4%CAGR, driven by labor productivity increases, and reflected in exports. Even if the government continues the current pace and theme of reforms, growth rates (GDP) of ~6% are expected in future. We strongly feel that Indian Industry deserves the best in World class technology. This production centre is our effort in making that technology affordable.”

GEA Westfalia Separator India’s planning for Production in India, started in late 2005 to address the growing needs of the local Indian market as well as to address the cost effective solution of the global market. Prototype Decanter centrifuge UCD 205 was developed at Bangalore and since then Indian Production has crossed several milestones.

Currently GEA Westfalia Separator India Bangalore unit is successfully producing Decanters up to 350mm diameter for global market for environmental application as well as addressing the needs of the Indian market for various applications. Since 2006 GEA Westfalia Separator India Bangalore unit has exported & installed approximately 500 decanters worldwide. Presently this unit can produce 250 Decanters per year.

With this expansion, GEA Westfalia Separator India Bangalore unit will be able to increase its output capacity as well as find opportunities to address the demand for other market segments by adding small process specific customizations said Mr Ashok Narula, MD , GEA India.

GEA Westfalia Separator is an old and reputed company that was established at the end of 19th century in Westphalia, an area in the north of Germany, from where the company derives its name– Westfalia Separator. 120 years ago, GEA Westfalia Separator started first with the production of milk separators, separating cream from milk. Afterward GEA Westfalia Separator moved step by step into many other fields and applications - food, industry and mineral oil.