Elite Material Handling Co provides logistics solution in material handling related to transportation, storage loading/unloading palletisation and package. The company helps in smooth movement of goods in factories and warehouses with its highly efficient and safe equipment. In this interview, Manpreet Sachdev, Founder & CEO, Elite Material Handling Co, elaborates on changing dynamics in the warehousing sector and the company’s plans to tap the emerging trends.

What kinds of material handling equipment do you supply?
We manufacture all types of material handling equipment (MHE) in India with manufacturing facilities in Mumbai, Poona and Bangalore. We offers products like dock levellers, scissor lift, goods lift, dock doors, dock safety products, truck lock, truck bumpers, mini dock, pallet trucks, BOPT, HOPT, HVLS fans, etc. We serve industries such as automotive, textile, engineering, wind energy, plastic, packaging, mining, defence, aerospace, oil and gas, toys, testing & fixtures, construction, off highway, coal, etc.

What kinds of changes are you witnessing in the logistics & warehousing space?
We are seeing the logistic industry is improving its efficiency with hi-tech equipment. The warehouse space is becoming more modern with customer investing in advanced solutions and trying to optimise space.

The key challenge that companies face is how to integrate various systems to ensure safe material movement cost-effectively.

How is Elite helping companies to improve their efficiency?
Elite provides turnkey solutions of world class design & quality, yet economically priced.

With companies (i.e. your customers) talking about building “smart” factories, how is Elite helping these companies to efficiently manage their logistics & warehousing operations?
Not many companies are building smart factories as they cost a lot of capital to build. To make a ‘smart’ factory you have to plan from the foundation of the factory and design the whole system to save on cost and time.

We are in forefront in smart factories and have a separate division which can assist the customer from the drawing board to the final operation. There are many systems to be followed and compliance to be cleared.

Is the demand for automated (and semi-automated) material handling equipment (MHE) solutions increasing?
The demand for material handling equipment is in upswing as there is always a shortage for labour and companies are in process to minimise manual operation. We always understand the customer problems and apply our solution with more than sixty years’ experience in MHE field.

What are key trends observed in the logistics & warehousing sector with respect to usage of MHE systems and solutions?
The storage is moving vertical due to cost of space increasing and material is moved in all areas to store, operate and retrieve. Customers are optimising space to max and they need our advice to help them save the space and cost.

What are your plans to further tap the logistics & warehousing segment?
Due to Made in India initiative of the government and public sector undertakings (PSUs), we always add more new products year-on-year and also increase our capacity to make more products. We are always in hunt for foreign companies to collaborate and get more products in Indian market in the long run.

In future, electric MHE will be the norm as Euro 6 is getting common and other MHE will have less demand and usage. Utility vehicles will also go autonomous where they will work only by artificial intelligence. You can site in remote location and the equipment will operate with simple command. After a while the system will get trained by itself and do the operation without any external help.