Bharat Earth Movers Limited (BEML), a public sector unit under Ministry of Defence with a unique role of serving diverse sectors of the Indian economy, continues its excellence in the mining equipment industry.

BEML has state-of-the-art manufacturing facilities at Kolar Gold Fields in Karnataka (KGF). At KGF, BEML rolls out hydraulic excavators, rope shovels, bulldozers, wheel dozers, wheel loaders, pipe layers, tyre handlers etc. At its Mysore unit, the company manufactures mining trucks, motor graders, water sprinklers, aircraft towing tractors and heavy-duty diesel engines. The Bangalore unit is engaged in the manufacture of metro coaches, railway equipment and defence products.

From being an importer and supplier of Komatsu-made dozers to Indian Army and Border Roads Organisation, to become a licensed manufacturer of mining equipment, BEML has travelled a long way to turn into a global company providing total mining equipment solutions. In the past, it collaborated with countries like Japan and USA for a number of equipment. This included transfer of technology for excavators, dozers, dumpers and loaders. At present, it has been in a position to manufacture the equipment indigenously.

BEML has taken several initiatives to introduce high-value equipment as well as environment-friendly technology to mining in India. This is aptly demonstrated in inducting BD475/770 HP bulldozers with giant ripper in bauxite and cement sector which has helped in offsetting hazardous blasting in mines. The BE1600 hydraulic excavator, the largest indigenously manufactured machine supplied to Eastern Coalfield, recently demonstrated a low fuel consumption and an increased productivity.

Driven by a result-oriented R&D, BEML has developed over 30 products in the last 40 years. The most successful products have been 41-ton and 70-ton pipelayers deployed for carrying and laying pipelines in gas and water supply and shifting of conveyors in coal mines.

The company is also making major inroads into infrastructure sector with supply of small-size excavators, graders, dozers and loaders for deployment in road construction and highway projects like Golden Quadrilateral, North-East-West-South Corridor and Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojna. Its products have takers in over 25 countries in Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East. The firm has steady markets in Tunisia, Syria, Jordan, Iraq, Kuwait and Ghana. BEML is concentrating on accentuating its global presence by an aggressive marketing and participation in trade fairs.

BEML has an excellent research and development (R&D) facility with over 400 designers and R&D engineers. It has been planning to indigenously develop state-of-the-art technology products for applications in underground mining, river linking, port handling etc.

During 2002-03, BEML achieved a sales turnover of Rs 1681 crore registering a growth of 18 per cent over the previous year. It had a production worth Rs 1740 crore. The total profit before tax was Rs 37.87 crore.