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Local pumps distributor partners with French company to expand range

30th August 2013

  

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Germiston-based pumps distributor Ecochem Pumps was last year appointed exclusive distributor of the French pumps manufacturer Soméflu’s range of chemical transfer pumps throughout South Africa and neighbouring countries, and is already supplying the Soméflu pumps to several industries, including the mining industry.

In late April, Soméflu’s international sales manager Adrien Hourlier visited South Africa to provide support and further strengthen the relationship with Ecochem.
Ecochem has for many years supplied the market with pumps manufacturer Milton Roy’s range of chemical dosing pumps, which is complementary to Soméflu chemical transfer pumps in process operations.

The compatibility of the new range of pumps with existing ranges is expected to help Soméflu with initial sales and, during Hourlier’s visit, Ecochem Pumps made use of the installed Milton Roy product base to introduce the range to existing customers.

Plans for South Africa

Ecochem recently received a significant order for Soméflu pumps from a leading platinum mine, in the North West. These pumps are already supplied and installed and are expected to be commissioned soon.

“Ecochem will also be making an effort to target new petrochemical and chemical manufacturing plants in South Africa, and anticipates capturing a respectable share of the business emanating from locally designed and managed projects,” says Ecochem Pumps GM Richard Rudling.

However, he adds that the challenge with new plants will be to gain entry to those that are funded from abroad. In such cases, he believes that one could expect most of the products incorporated in the plant to be sourced from the country funding the project.

“We will target replacement business in these overseas-funded projects where substandard quality products are most likely to be used. In some instances, the foreign products that will be used are not built to last and represent a comparatively high lifetime cost of ownership. We will be ready to help when the plant operators discover this fact, and provide them with better quality products,” states Rudling.

Current Trends

Hourlier states that the chemical transfer pumps market is generally shrinking in terms of small orders, but growing for larger orders. “This is as a result of the trend towards the closure of smaller plants in many industries, and their replacement by larger plants with a greater throughput, which can take advantage of economies of scale to deliver a lower cost of production for each unit.

Hourlier explained that almost any type of plant makes use of some sort of corrosive fluids, resulting in the Soméflu range of pumps having almost universal application. Soméflu technology is also applied to water treatment, which Hourlier sees as an important growth path for the company in Africa.

Rudling adds that Ecochem Pumps will also be looking at steel production for the Soméflu product, as a result of the French company’s international experience in pickling applications and acid regeneration.

The company has 50 years’ experience in the chemical transfer business.

“Overall we understand what the customer needs. When an enquiry is received, we apply our engineering experience to the specific application, in order to understand it and correctly diagnose it. We then supply the most appropriate pump for a lowest total lifetime cost. Ecochem Pumps also has a good experience of understanding exactly what it is that the customer needs, another reason why we selected them as our Southern African distributor,” states Rudling.

“Soméflu was established in 1962, so their products are backed by expertise of more than 50 years. Of particular importance are the plastics that Soméflu has developed for use in the construction of their pumps. Soméflu has the only plastics in the pump industry, which are specifically designed to handle abrasion,” notes Rudling.

Further, Rudling says most of the com-pany’s competitors use standard poly- propylene, and their products suffer from abrasive wear. The Soméflu pump has an advantage in this market in terms of resis-tance to abrasion, as well as the advantage of the ultraviolet ray-resistant pump casing, which Ecochem’s competitors do not have.

“A Soméflu pump can be left to bake in the Karoo sun and will last for many years. For these reasons, I expect the Soméflu product to do well in this region,” he boasts.

Life-Cycle Costing

Although the rand’s current tendency towards slow depreciation will obviously have a direct impact on product pricing, Rudling emphasises that Ecochem is familiar with effective price management because of the company’s imports of Milton Roy products.

Commenting on this, Rudling says Soméflu pumps will be priced competitively.

He points out that the company will not be competing on the price of the pump alone but also on ensuring the pump has lowest lifetime costs.

Hourlier highlights the importance of educating the market on the fact that the quality of the Soméflu product means that it is sometimes better to invest a little bit more on a quality product than to buy down and perhaps have to replace the cheaper product two or three times – and stop the production process while so doing – in the lifetime for which the single Soméflu pump would have lasted.

“In the long run, the customer will save by buying Soméflu, irrespective of the exchange rate,” Hourlier concludes.

Edited by Megan van Wyngaardt
Creamer Media Contributing Editor Online

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