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Business Line - Saturday, July 24, 2004.
A DEVICE to tackle the problem of overspeeding by heavy vehicles -Road Speed Limiter, developed indigenously by a Coimbatore-based company belonging to the Bannari Amman Sugars group, is to be launched shortly. The company, Bannari Infotech Private Ltd, is the second Coimbatore-based company to enter this field after Pricol Ltd that had launched electronic road speed limiter. Bannari Info, apart from selling the product through retailers, also is exploring the possibility of marketing it as original equipment and is holding talks with a few vehicle manufacturers in this regard. Speaking to newsperson's in Coimbatore, the Managing Director, Mr K.S. Sundararaman, said the company had developed in the past tour years products like GPS that help in tracking vehicle movement and has now come out with road speed limiter which he felt would be very helpful in checking over-speeding by heavy vehicles. He said the new product is an electro-mechanical device in which the travel speed of the vehicle could be pre-set. Once the vehicle reaches the pre-set speed, the fuel flow to the engine gets regulated, not in any abrupt manner but in a systematic way, so that there is no sudden jerk and the vehicle is not brought to any immediate halt, which would have an impact on road safety. The product has undergone stringent quality checks at the Automobile Research Association of India, Pune, which has certified the product. Mr. Sundararaman expected the product to retail in the Rs. 16,000/- Rs. 17,000 price band and would come with a one year warranty. He said it would be priced at least 5 per cent cheaper compared to its nearest competitor. He said the company aimed initially' for a production of 5,000-10,000 units annually, but it has the capacity to scale up production to 1,00,000 units once the demand picks up. While it would be available in the retail market shortly, the company is also discussing with vehicle manufacturers to make it a factory fitted device. Mr Sundararaman said apart from the domestic market, the company is also exploring opportunities for exporting it to countries in South East Asia and New Zealand. |