What is pleasing the Yash Birla Group company is that consumers are increasingly opting for its environment friendly liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) based generators.

"Many consumers are moving towards LPG based generators, doing away with the kerosene and diesel based ones that are not only costly to operate but also cause pollution," said Sanjay Khazanchi, president and CEO of Birla Power Solutions.

In a tie-up with state-owned Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd (HPCL), Birla Power Solutions (BPS) last year launched LPG based generators that not only fulfil the needs of homes but also commercial institutions.

"The frequent power cuts during summer are seeing a 30 percent growth in the sales of our gensets and inverters. The sales really go up in cities during summer," Khazanchi told IANS.

In normal times the growth in gensets is about five percent and for inverters about 20 percent plus. This summer, Maharashtra, Delhi and Kerala are among the states driving the demand for generators and invertors.

Formerly known as Birla Yamaha Ltd, the company in December 2003 bought off its foreign partners. With a turnover of Rs.720 million, it is targeting a turnover of Rs.1 billion in the next two years.

The optimism stems for recent orders including a long-term (two year) UNICEF contract awarded this month to provide 0.5KVA-2.5KVA capacity kerosene-run gensets.
 
Eying a bigger institutional demand for long-term solutions "as the power deficiency is expected to be a persistent problem for the next 10 or more years" the company is looking at extending its range of gensets from 0.5KVA-5.0KVA up to 15KVA.

The BPS range of gensets are currently in the range of Rs.15,000 to Rs.100,000 for a 5.0KVA capacity.

"We are also planning to bring solar solutions in the next six months or one year targeting to cater to the needs of individual homes to provide back up to invertors and provide solar water heating solutions," said Khazanchi.

Once the company is able to provide solar solutions to invertors, people would be able to recharge them with the help of small solar panels during daytime and be better equipped to cope with power cuts of over six hours.

"We are seriously looking for a partner - Indian or overseas - to develop solar cells as power solutions. Our research wing is actively involved in this direction," said Khazanchi.

Despite facing stiff competition in the domestic market, the BPS is optimistic of going strong particularly with the growing demand for its genset conversion kits for switching from kerosene or diesel to LPG.

"We are also exporting significant quantities of gensets, inverters and agriculture pumps and equipments to African, Middle East and South American countries. With the Middle East acting as a trading hub, we are tapping markets in Afghanistan, Iraq, Egypt and North Africa," the official said.