Industry: Aerospace Industry

Product: Efficient Supply chain for Battery Pack raw material - Molicel 18650, P28A battery

Challenge: Supply of BIS compliant batteries

Favorite features: Robust supply chain with zero hiccups 

Result: Provided Compliant batteries with an overall 40% cost reduction. 

About the Client

Our client is a reputed B2G agriculture drone manufacturer based in Bengaluru, Karnataka. They address the UAV market by specialising in aircraft design and its analysis methods in all aspects from a comprehensive system level perspective. 

“We faced challenges with other batteries-like inconsistent performance, limited endurance, and safety concerns. It then became evident to us that the procurement of high-performance, high-quality batteries was necessary” said  CEO of the reputed agricultural drone manufacturing company.

He added, “we chose Molicel because they are the only Lithium Ion battery manufacturers that provide high capacity, higher energy density along with low IR rating and a high discharge rate all packed in a small cylindrical tube. And that makes it suitable for our agricultural application where high flying time is required”

Check out more about molicel here 

Why Procurabl ?

Client Challenges:

The agriculture drone manufacturer's primary challenges were threefold-

1) They needed batteries to comply with Indian regulations, but their preferred supplier was unwilling to undertake the costly certification process only for the Indian market. 

2) Their existing supply chain was plagued with shipping nightmares due to poor stacking and manhandling to cargo theft, and excessive duty payments, resulting in delays and increased expenses.

3) Lack of visibility

For the purchase manager of the reputed agricultural drone manufacturing company, the lack of transparency and communication resulting in an overall delay in manufacturing updates posed a challenge, especially overseas.

Procurabl recognized the unique characteristics of the client's needs and developed a fit to scale, tailored solution.

Solution: 

After exhaustive exploration, Procurabl devised a strategy. We sourced batteries from Molicel and shipped them to a low-cost country in South-East Asia, for carrying out secondary processes to meet the client's requirements.

To implement the solution successfully, Procurabl scaled up its facilities and worked closely with Molicel and South East Asian partner to streamline the procurement process. With our ‘Demand Consolidation’ offering, Procurabl maximized cost savings and reduced lead times by folds. 

"Battery cost in a drone is 60-70% of the final drone cost and Procurabl's expertise in navigating the cost-quality tradeoff for us has been invaluable. We chose Procurabl for their deep understanding of battery tech and they fulfilled our expectations by providing absolute transperancy & visibility in the processes" said the Supply Chain Head of the agricultural drone manufacturing company.

A competitive advantage delivered by us via supply chain efficiency:

"The results of our strategic procurement were remarkable. By efficiently consolidating demand, the landed cost of batteries was reduced by 40% in a year. With the lithium prices going down in China, we are looking at reducing the landed cost by 60% from the status quo. Thus providing the client an upper hand in the market for reducing their drone costs and improving their revenue" - Ninad Kashid, CEO of Procurabl

At the same time, previously Molicel received orders in lower volume, incurring losses in the form of extra labor expenses and, Procurabl helped them overcome this by effectively expanding their market presence in India and converting lower volumes to large ones.

The success achieved here prompted us to invest heavily in battery pack manufacturing along with all our partners, signifying a promising future together.