Hindustan Syringes to up production capacity

As part of its ongoing three-year expansion strategy at an investment of Rs 100 crore, Haryana-based Hindustan Syringes and Medical Devices Limited (HMD) proposes to enhance the production capacity of syringes and needles at its multiple manufacturing facilities in Haryana this year.

The company, touted as the largest syringe manufacturer in Asia, has eight manufacturing plants at Ballabgarh in Haryana.

HMD's standard disposable syringe 'Dispovan' is the brand leader in the syringe market in India. In 2003, under the license from Star Syringe of UK, the company has started manufacturing K1, the first non-reusable (known as auto-disable) syringe in India under the Kojak Selinge brand.

"To meet the increasing demand from the domestic and overseas markets, we are now expanding out production capacity at our plants in Haryana. Currently, we manufacture over 1.2 billion syringes and 2 billion needles a year. We plan to increase the production capacity to more than 1.5 billion syringes and 2.5 billion needles in 2007," Rajiv Nath, joint managing director of HMD, told Business Standard.

HMD's products include syringes, cannulas, needles, insulin syringes, surgical blades, blood collection sets and vein sets. The company supplies its Kojak AD syringes to Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka.

At present, over five states including Madhya Pradesh, Delhi and Assam are on the company's radar, while five more states are evincing interest in placing orders for AD syringes.

According to Rajiv Nath, annually over 4 billion injections are being administered in India from less than 2 billion syringes, while the gap indicates the reverse.

HMD, with equal focus on both regular disposable and AD syringes, commands a 60 per cent domestic market share.

Stating that cannulas, surgical blades and insulin syringes comprise its main export products, he said that exports contributed over 15 per cent to the company's revenues in 2006-07.

"HMD crossed the Rs 275-crore mark in revenues during the financial year ended March 31, 2007. We are looking at achieving revenues of over Rs 300 crore in the current fiscal, with the exports accounting for over 20 per cent," Nath said.