Swedish origins – global presence Alfa Laval

SWEDISH ORIGINS – GLOBAL PRESENCE

All industries use cooling, heating, flow and separation in their daily operation. Alfa Laval’s engineering solutions have been an integral part of these operations for over 125 years.

Alfa Laval specialises in valves and other industrial processing equipment, and there are three main product lines: separation (centrifuges), fluid handling (pumps and valves), and heat transfer (heat exchangers). Its equipment and services are designed to help optimise processes such as heating, cooling, separating and transporting products such as beverages/food, biofuels, chemicals, petrochemicals and pharmaceuticals.

Gustav de Laval, who invented the centrifugal separator, founded the company in 1883 and the Alfa Laval AB group’s headquarters are still located in Sweden. The group holds more than 300 patents, and invests approximately 2.5 per cent of sales in research and development, resulting in over 35 new products each year. Customers are found in approximately 100 countries, and include BASF, Bayer, Heineken, Shell and Tetra Laval among others. The company has 28 large production units (15 in Europe, eight in Asia and four in the USA), and 70 service centres. Its 11 400 employees are working in Sweden, Denmark, India, China, the USA and France.

According to the company’s interim report in June: “The demand continued to develop positively during the second quarter of the year. The order intake increased 32 per cent compared to the corresponding period last year.”

Alfa Laval in India

Alfa Laval traces its presence in India back to 1937 when it was represented there – alongside other Swedish companies – by the Vulcan Trading Company Pvt. Ltd. A few years later a merger resulted in the new name Vulcan Laval Ltd, in ’81 Alfa Laval AB became the majority share holder, and in 1987 the name changed to Alfa Laval India Ltd. Since 1993 the company has been a full subsidiary of the Swedish group, encompassing a registered office at Pune and factories in Maharashra.

Alfa Laval India is an established supplier of plate and spiral exchangers, centrifugal separators and decanters as well

as sanitary flow equipment, and for certain models of these products it has the status of Group Manufacturing Unit for the global market. The subsidiary is recognised for its special expertise in process equipment fabrication in SS and other exotic metals.

Additionally, Alfa Laval India acts as the global hub for executing Alfa Laval projects in distillery and vegetable oil refineries in South Africa, China, Nigeria, Middle East, Turkey, Russia and Bangladesh.

A good year for India

Alfa Laval has been present in India for more than 70 years, and the Tata Group has been a customer for half of this time – almost four decades. Tata Salt was India’s first packaged iodised salt and is today the leading Indian salt brand. Tata Chemicals was the country’s first salt producer to use vacuum evaporation in this process.

In September 2010 Tata Chemicals placed an order worth about SEK 60 million for heat exchangers to be used in evapora-

tion systems for production of salt in India. The Alfa Laval heat exchangers will be used to concentrate sea water brine for production of table salt and concentrated brine for caustic soda production.

There were two more major orders from refineries. The first, to the value of SEK 50 million, provides Alfa Laval Packinox heat exchangers for a catalytic process to remove sulphur from refined diesel. The unique Packinox heat exchangers are widely used in the refinery and petrochemical industry as they have an unmatched energy efficiency, well suited for these demanding applications. The second, worth about SEK 110 million, involves the heat exchangers to be used in a catalytic chemical process for mixed xylene which, among other things, can be used for production of PET bottles.

“Four out of the five large orders Alfa Laval has received recently have been in India. India became our fourth largest market during the third quarter and I expect it to become number three in the near future”, says Lars Renström, president and CEO of the Alfa Laval Group.

A ‘healthy’ order volume of SEK 115 million

Driven by increased living standards and a growing population, the edible oil industry in India is expected to grow 6 per cent annually, and reach 20 million tonnes of consumption by 2015.

Following an earlier SEK 50 million order in February, the most recent order received in June was for a complete solution for a vegetable oil plant in India. The order value is about SEK 65 million and delivery is scheduled for 2012. The order includes a variety of Alfa Laval products such as separators, mixers and heat exchangers and will be used for refining different types of crude oils – e.g. soya bean – into high quality oils. “We continue to see good developments in India,” says Lars Renström, president and CEO of the Alfa Laval Group. “The latest order confirms this positive trend.” n