We are manufacturing construction hoists for more than 50 years and we never had safety-related accidents on them when the hoists are operated properly.

Mr Martin, how do you see the opportunities in Indian market?
The Indian market is new for us. The opportunities in construction development is having a huge scope and with endless scale. The technology which we are bringing is suitable for the needs of tall buildings in India. Though our machines are comparatively expensive, we can offer customers more reliability, durability and safety. We are offering construction hoist for high-rise buildings.

What do you have to say about your JV with Esquire?
We have established a JV with Esquire, which means that Esquire will be manufacturing our construction industry related products and we will be providing all the training and technology which is necessary to manufacture and for assembling the products. We can expect that once the product is tested we can start it for manufacturing and the price will be less as there will no import duty.
We plan to manufacture the entire product line. Hence we have spare parts availability and production facility in Baroda. This durable and reliable hoist comes up with great service availability. Thus we are bringing an interesting product which will be able to compete to the rest of the offerings.

When can we expect your manufacturing facility in India?
We are redesigning the hoist to suit Indian Construction Industry. Now the production of prototype has started which will be finished by the end of January. Then we will test it and work on it in order to make it ready for further production. So, if everything goes as per plan, the prototype production will start in March this year. Both companies have 50 per cent shares in JV.

What makes you different from your competitors?
We take special care while manufacturing hoist – we do not compromise on the materials used. Most of our customers are rental companies and big developers. They expect high durability and reliability in product because they need limited breakdowns and lesser maintenance. This is our key benefit. And also we have wide variety of product range to suit the requirements of Industry. Our ability to customise the hoist is also one of our differentiator.

Which are the products you offer for high-rise construction?
Stros Esquire joint venture company will be offering construction hoist for high-rise buildings. The product range will include NOV2032 equipped with VFD (variable frequency drive), having speed of 40 metres per minute, capacity 2 tonnes. This will be the first product to be assembled in India.

For special requirements of customers like high-speed machines up to 100 metres per minute, and super high rise buildings will be manufactured in India.

How safe your Hoist are?
We are manufacturing construction hoists for more than 50 years and we never had safety-related accidents on them when the hoists are operated properly. Our major customers are from the US, Canada and Russia where safety standards are very high and of utmost priority. So, safety is one of the major features of our hoists and we pay due attention to it. We ensure the same kind of attention from Esquire.

What are major safety features your hoists have?
Every motor of our hoists are equipped with brakes which are capable enough to hold a hoist in its position when fully loaded. So if we have two drives in a construction hoist there are two independent brakes each one is capable of holding a hoist in case of power failure or any such incidence. If due to some unexpected both the brakes fail, though it never happens, there is a TUV certified safety device designed by Stros, which is patented. It will slowly stop the hoist and prevent it from falling.

Are you going to manufacture this safety device in India?
Safety device is one of the machines which will not be manufactured in India. We’ll also import our pinions and rollers from Czech Republic because we realised that customers in India have big issues of higher material consumption on rollers. Pinions and rollers are replaced in every 3-4 months which is very difficult to perform at construction site. So we’ll provide our pinions which have longer life span of around 3,000 working hours. Usually, in US, our customers replace their pinions or rollers in 3-4 years period. This is a big saving for end-users as it reduces replacement and downtime.

At bC India, Defence Minister visited your stall and talked about the products for defence. What are the products Stros has for defence?
We are manufacturing special purpose elevators which are used in dry docks for providing the maintenance and uploading materials to the submarines. This is industrial elevator based on the mobile platform which allows travel based hoists in dry docks to move in different positions which is necessary for maintenance of submarines. We have developed such platforms for the Royal Navy and they are using for last 5 years satisfactorily.

Apart from these, we make elevators for many other applications and are being used around the world. One of the most prestigious customers we have is the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) which have our industrial elevators on rocket launching towers. Most recently, our elevator was used for launching of Korean rocket.

Martin Hamácek,
Director,
Stros Esquire Elevators & Hoists Pvt Ltd