my report.docx

Summer Project Report

On

“Research and Development

of mechanism to dispose off SiO2 (100 MT / Month) through Sale / Alternate

product development / reduction in generation with Positive Realization in

Environment friendly and Statutory compliant way and integrate it with existing

supply chain”

undertaken at

Sterlite Technologies Limited

In The Partial Fulfillment of Summer Internship

of

Post Graduate Diploma in Industrial Engineering (PGDIE)

By

Prashant Sharma (Roll No. - 62)

PGDIE- 43

Under the guidance of

Mr. Mukundan R Mrs. Swati Goyal

Asst. Professor AGM – Supply Chain

NITIE, Mumbai Sterlite Technologies Ltd.

National Institute of Industrial Engineering (NITIE), Mumbai-400087

(April 2014 – June 2014)

Contents

Certificates Acknowledgements Executive Summary

1. Introduction

2. Project Scope 2.1. Project Title2.2 Need for Project2.3 Project Overview2.4 Scope 2.5 Deliverables

3. Literature Review 4. Methodology

4.1 Understanding4.2 Research & Development4.3 Production4.4 Earlier Attempt4.5 Case Study – Industry to focus

4.5.1 Few Facts4.5.2 Research Paper4.5.3 Silica – Applications4.5.4 Maharashtra – Limitless Possibilities4.5.5 Two ways to approach

4.5.6 Conclusion5. Data Collection and Execution5.1 New Customers5.2 Observations5.3 Integrating the supply chain

5.3.1 Pareto Analysis5.3.2 AHP(Analytic hierarchy process)5.3.3 Relation Diagram5.3.4 Tree Diagram

6. Conclusion & Scope for future workSummer Project, NITIE Mumbai Page 2

6.1 Conclusion6.2 Future Scope

Academic ConclusionProfessional ConclusionReferenceAppendices

List of Illustrations

Tables Table 1: Timeline of Events Table 2: InfrastructureTable 3: Fruit Zone of MaharashtraTable 4: Normalized Cost

Summer Project, NITIE Mumbai Page 3

Figures Figure 1: CustomersFigure 2: Business OverviewFigure 3: Silica & TypesFigure 4: Pareto ChartFigure 5: Pairwise MatrixFigure 6: Tree Diagram of Customer AssessmentFigure 7: Relation DiagramFigure 8: Tree Chart

Certificate of Project Completion

This is to certify that Prashant Sharma, student of PGDIE, Batch No. 43 has

successfully completed the project titled “Research and Development of mechanism to

dispose off SiO2 (100 MT / Month) through Sale / Alternate product development / reduction


in generation with Positive Realization in Environment friendly

and Statutory compliant way and integrate it with existing supply chain” at Sterlite

Technologies Ltd., Optical Fiber Division, Waluj, Aurangabad under guidance of Asst

Prof. Mukundan R, NITIE Mumbai and Mrs. Swati Goyal, AGM - Supply Chain

Management Sterlite Technologies Limited , Waluj, Aurangabad from 7 th April, 2014 to 6th

June, 2014.

Based on the professional work done by him/her, this report is being submitted for the partial

fulfillment of Post Graduation Diploma in Industrial Engineering (PGDIE) at NITIE,

Mumbai.

Date: 06th June, 2014

Mukundan R Mrs. Swati Goyal

Asst Professor AGM, Supply Chain

NITIE, Mumbai Sterlite Technologies Limited

Certificate of Originality

This is to certify that the project entitled “Research and Development of mechanism to

dispose off SiO2 (100 MT / Month) through Sale / Alternate product development / reduction

in generation with Positive Realisation in Environment friendly and Statutory compliant way


and integrate it with existing supply chain” has been carried out by

me at Sterlite Technologies Ltd., Optical Fiber Division, Waluj, Aurangabad under

guidance of Asst Prof. Mukundan R, NITIE Mumbai and Mrs. Swati Goyal, AGM -

Supply Chain Management Sterlite Technologies Limited , Waluj, Aurangabad from 7 th

April, 2014 to 6th June, 2014.

Based on the professional work done by me, I am submitting this report for the partial

fulfillment of Post Graduation Diploma in Industrial Engineering (PGDIE) at NITIE,

Mumbai. This report has not been published and submitted to any other institute or university.

Date: 06th June, 2014

Prashant Sharma

Roll No.: 62

PGDIE (Batch of 2013-15)

NITIE, Mumbai

Acknowledgement

“A novice cannot do great tasks. Many great people contribute to completion of his work

directly or indirectly”


Words fail me to express my sincerest gratitude to Mr.

Pankaj Priyadarshi, CCO, Sterlite Technologies Ltd. for providing me with the

opportunity to be a part of this prestigious company. I am very thankful to this esteemed

organization that has conferred on me the privilege to pragmatically convert my theoretical

knowledge into practicably viable experience and have an insight and understanding of the

forthcoming corporate life. I am highly indebted to my Mentor Mrs. Swati Goyal, AGM -

Supply Chain Management for offering me a unique platform to earn exposure and garner

my knowledge through this project. I specially take the opportunity to thank my Guide Mr.

Amit Ratnaparkhi, Manager, Supply Chain for his cooperation, expert guidance & sparing

valuable time to help me move forward in the right direction. I take this opportunity to extend

my sincere thanks to Mr. Shekhar Muley, Supply Chain Management for his kind support

& guidance.

I am very thankful to Prof. Mukundan R, NITIE for his constant support, criticism

and suggestions. Besides, a special vote of thanks to all the staff members of Sterlite

Technologies Limited, Waluj for providing a congenial environment without which it would

have been very difficult to successfully complete the internship.

I am thankful to the NITIE Communication Centre for providing guidelines for report

making.

Prashant Sharma

Roll – 62, PGDIE

NITIE Mumbai

Executive Summary

This project work is done to solve the very crucial and live problem of unsold and loss

making disposal of by-product Silica in Aurangabad plant of Sterlite Technologies Limited.


Presently, 100 MT of Silica is produced monthly with negligible

takers which results in loss making operation of disposing the excess amount in

environmental friendly and statutory compliant way.

The sole objective of this work is to develop an end to end mechanism right from

production to disposal by converting the same to a profit making operation from loss making

one. It includes product development, marketing and integrating the whole supply chain

associated with it in such a way to realize sustainable net profit to the organization as a whole.

The methodology followed to achieve the goal includes thorough and careful study of

production and specification of our product and by-product followed by matching it with the

requirements of the different industries and scope of aligning it with our specification. This is

followed by initiating and coordinating the business talk with the perspective customers and

negotiating the final agreement. Lastly, the supply chain needs to be integrated considering

new customers’ requirement and company’s interest.

The project proved to be very fruitful with successful inception of 3 new customers

under different phases of business talks and negotiation. One of them even issued purchase

order of 200 kgs of Silica which has been fulfilled. A case study is also done to come out with

the most suitable industry to focus for our silica. Pesticide industry comes out as outcome of

that. Relation Diagram is prepared to understand the root cause of problem which comes to be

inferior quality. Pareto and AHP analysis were done as an attempt to assess the customers and

integrate the supply chain.

Quality control, standardizing the specification and having a holistic approach to high

probability industries like Pesticide should be done as future perspective.

Chapter – 1

Introduction


Chapter - 2

PROJECT SCOPE

2.1 Project title

“Research and Development of mechanism to dispose off SiO2 (100 MT / Month)

through Sale / Alternate product development / reduction in generation with Positive

Realization in Environment friendly and Statutory compliant way and integrate it with

existing supply chain”

2.2 Need of the project

Sterlite is a big name in the field of superior quality optical fiber , cables and

conductors. It has been on top in the industry for long but maintaining the position takes more

effort than gaining it. Most of its market is in foreign countries like China, UK, UAE and

Russia are few to be named, as far as optical fiber business is concerned. The ever increasing

customer’s expectation and competition leaves no scope for flaw in the product. This is a

challenge as well as constraint for any top notch company like Sterlite .Technology products

like optical fibers need to be perfect on quality front. We don’t want our electronic signal to


be attenuated and to reduce energy loss; a very sophisticated

production and business practices are required. Sterlite understands it and has already

developed the best practices to ensure the quality of its product.

The era of Quality Assurance has arrived and Sterlite has already set up fully

integrated and automatic production facility in most of its plant. Optical fiber is made in

internal plant in Aurangabad. It is a state of art facility which makes silica by treating Silicon

Tetrachloride, Hydrogen and Oxygen.

Core:

GeCl4 + 2H2 + O2 (heat) GeO2 + 4HCl

Cladding:

SiCl4 + 2H2 + O2 (heat) SiO2 + 4HCl

Then, Silica so produced is allowed to deposit on a rod and drawn into fibers at an

elevated temperature by an automatic and highly sophisticated mechanism. Special care is

taken to ensure the quality of the fibers.

Not every silica produced is deposited, some escape which is then stored in jumbo

bags. This is highly pure Silica which may be used in various industries but not in high grade

Optical fibers due to quality concerns. Not only this, Silica so collected has to be disposed as

waste which incurs extra cost to company.

This project work is an attempt to develop a mechanism to dispose this Silica and

integrate it with existing supply chain.

2.3 Project overview


This project is done in Aurangabad plant of Sterlite

Technologies Limited with a view to increase the profitability of the overall plant.100

MT/month is the production rate of the undeposited Silica. This Silica cannot be reused to

produce Optical Fiber. And even disposing it to some safe place is non-value adding as well

as a loss making affair. The paper work involved in disposal in an Environment friendly and

Statutory compliant way again requires extra effort and hinder perfect focusing in company’s

core competency.

The management of Sterlite has put this issue on priority as it was incurring

continuous cost to company. It is a live and very crucial project for the company which will

significantly increase the profitability. The earlier it is done, better it is for the company.

Silica, which is the by-product in optical fiber manufacturing is currently being disposed off

and dumped which incurs cost to the company. The problem lies on the fact that there is no or

minimal taker of silica being generated here. This is not the first attempt to solve this

problem. Earlier also few steps were taken and some projects had been undertaken but there is

still a large gap which this project work aims to fill. There needs to be an integrated and

holistic view of the root cause and a feasible solution of the same.

Few things need to be understood well before analyzing the ways this by-product can be

disposed –

1) Environmental Issue – As a good corporate citizen, Sterlite has always been respecting

and concerned about the environment and cherish the gift of nature. In consistency

with the above philosophy, it always tries to establish harmony with nature. Disposal

of silica should not hinder the health of our environment and adversely affect the

society as a whole. So, every precautions and guidelines are followed as per statutory

requirements. The chemical and physical characteristics of Silica are detailed in

MSDS (Material Safety and Data Sheet) which also provides the information about

possible hazards and its remedies.


2) Statutory Compliance way - It includes all the legal

policies as per guidelines given by government of India and that of state to dispose

industrial waste within the regulations.

2.4 Scope

This project is actually multi-dimensional which includes fields like Supply Chain, marketing,

new product development and integration of these. That is the reason , it had to be approached

from three different perspectives which are explained later. The aim of the work is to integrate

every aspect of the product, right from its development and production to its

marketing and sales through an efficient supply chain. It gave me freedom to think in any

direction and interact with different departments and to develop an all-new perspective.

Followings are three modes which are to be considered:

1) Development of a mechanism to dispose SiO2 through sale-

This is but natural to look for takers of the given bye-product which can’t be used for

in-house production. But, there are bigger issues while doing it practically. The

approach should include studying the customer’s requirement and looking for the most

appropriate match not only in profitable way but also considering the constraints

involved with logistics and supply chain.

2) Product Development to meet market specifications –

The bye-product which we are dealing with may not be most suitable input in other

industries. This generates the scope of developing and matching the specification of

Silica with the requirement of customers. This may include purifying or adding

additives for some special feature as desired by customer in the product.

3) Reduction in production of SiO2-

This includes any possibility of reducing the production of bye-product at the first

place. Since the sole reason of accumulation of bye product in this case is actually due


to the fact that not all Silica gets sticked to the rod and escapes.

Though, plant is highly automated, there may be some scope to increase the efficiency

of this process.

2.5 Deliverables

To dispose the excess Silica in a profitable way

Development of long term customer-vendor relationship

Integrating the existing supply chain with old and new customers

Discovering the root cause of unsold silica and developing an approach to solve it

Chapter - 3

Literature Review

This project work includes two things, firstly Silica (bye-product) and secondly

Supply Chain to dispose it. There are many inputs given in literature regarding silica and

its various forms and uses. Few management tools related to supply chain are also

available for assessing customers and integrating the supply chain with disposal of bye-

product. These two aspects are discussed separately underneath:

Silica-

Silica, also known as Silicon Dioxide is an oxide of element silica with chemical formula

– SiO2. It has been known since very long. It is most commonly found in form of

quartz, and also in body of living organisms. Silica is one of the most complex and most

abundant families of materials, existing both as several minerals and being produced

synthetically. Few form of Silica are fused quartz, crystal, fumed silica, silica gel,


and aerogels. It has a wide range of application across many

industries from solar panel to pharmaceuticals.

It is commonly extracted by mining but is also produced or generated as bye-product in

few industrial processes. For instance, it is generated in bulk as bye-product in the

production of Optical fibers in Sterlite, Aurangabad. Following is an excerpt from

‘Crystalline Silica and Health Website’ which clearly defines the types and characteristics

of Silica-

Silicon and oxygen are the two most abundant elements in the earth’s crust. Silica

is commonly found in nature as sand. Silica exists in many different forms that can

be crystalline as well as non-crystalline (amorphous)


Pyrogenic

Synthetic Amorphous Amorphous Crystalline

Thermal

Surface Modified

Electric Arc

Wet

Plasma Precipitated

Natural

Silica Gel

Crystobalite

Quartz

Tridymite

By-Product

Silica

Figure 3 – Silica & Types

Crystalline silica is hard, chemically inert and has a high melting point. These are

valued/important properties in various industrial uses.

Quartz is the most common form of crystalline silica and is the second most common

mineral on the earth’s surface. It is found in almost every type of rock i.e. igneous,

metamorphic and sedimentary. Since it is so abundant, quartz is present in nearly all

mining operations.

Cristobalite is scarce in nature. Some volcanic rocks and meteorites may contain small

amounts of it. Cristobalite may also form when quartz is heated at high temperatures

starting at 450°C. This is especially true during production and use of refractory materials

and/or during calcination of silica (between 800 and 1110°C).

As a result, there is a likelihood of exposure to cristobalite in occupational settings.

Tridymite is also a scarce mineral that is only found in nature in volcanic rocks and

meteorites. Tridymite, however, differs from cristobalite in that it is not stable during

quartz and refractory materials heating processes at conventional process temperatures. As


a result, exposures are very unlikely to occur in occupational or

other settings.

The respirable dust fraction corresponds to the proportion of an airborne particle,

which penetrates to the pulmonary alveolar region of the lungs.

Respirable crystalline silica is the respirable dust fraction of crystalline silica which

enters the body by inhalation. This term applies to workplace atmospheres.

Various uses of Silica

Silica finds wide application in a number of industries.It is virtually impossible to

imagine world without silica.We look around us and find items like ceramic

glass,paints,paper,tiles and many more which take Silica either as raw material or

additive. There are dozens of industries procuring suitable Silica as raw material. Some

important names are as under –

Adhesive

Ceramic

Cement

Glass

Marble

Paints

Pesticide

Pharmaceutical

Porcelain……..

…………and many more.

Either in bulk or traces, silica is being used in these industries.

Supply Chain


As per standard definition,” A supply chain is a system of

organizations, people, activities, information, and resources involved in moving a product

or service from supplier to customer. Supply chain activities transform natural

resources, raw materials, and components into a finished product that is delivered to the

end customer.” Just like B2C marketing, C2C must also have a sophisticated and agile

supply chain to get the desired level of service which is very crucial when one business

interacts with other. To make the whole supply chain profitable, integration of constituting

parties seem to be the key. Strategic decisions pertaining to each level of supply chain

need to be taken with sound management aptitude using management tools available in

literature.

Few analyses are always required to establish the profitability of the whole chain.

With respect to this project, some tools and techniques have been used to analyze and

justify the scope to sale the excess Silica to other Business.

Question is not only disposal of a by-product but it needs to be done in a sustainable

and profitable way.

Analytic hierarchy process (AHP) – The analytic hierarchy process (AHP) is a

structured technique for organizing and analyzing complex decisions, based on

mathematics and psychology. It was developed by Thomas L. Saaty in the 1970s and has

been extensively studied and refined since then.

It is one of the most versatile and widely used in a variety of management decision

making in various sectors like government, business, industry, healthcare, and education.

It is one of those very few tools which accepts qualitative as well as quantitative input. It


doesn’t directly provide the best option available but suggest

and support the decision making regarding the most apt as per given criteria or roles.

Users of the AHP first decompose their decision problem into a hierarchy of more easily

comprehended sub-problems, each of which can be analyzed Independently. The elements

of the hierarchy can relate to any aspect of the decision problem—tangible or intangible,

carefully measured or roughly estimated, well or poorly understood—anything at all that

applies to the decision at hand.

Once the hierarchy is built, the decision makers systematically evaluate its various

elements by comparing them to one another two at a time, with respect to their impact on

an element above them in the hierarchy. In making the comparisons, the decision makers

can use concrete data about the elements, but they typically use their judgments about the

elements' relative meaning and importance.


Goal

Criterion 3Criterion 1 Criterion 2

A Simple AHP hierarchy with 2 alternatives and 3 criteria

It is the essence of the AHP that human judgments, and not just the underlying

information, can be used in performing the evaluations.

The AHP converts these evaluations to numerical values that can be processed and

compared over the entire range of the problem. A numerical weight or priority is derived for

each element of the hierarchy, allowing diverse and often incommensurable elements to be

compared to one another in a rational and consistent way. This capability distinguishes the

AHP from other decision making techniques.


Alternativ

e 1

Aternative

2

Aternative

2

Aternative

1

Aternative

1

Aternative

2

In the final step of the process, numerical priorities are calculated for each of the

decision alternatives. These numbers represent the alternatives' relative ability to achieve the

decision goal, so they allow a straightforward consideration of the various courses of action.

Parato Analysis – It is a very effective tool for prioritizing things and thus, help in focusing

on the major and more crucial causes of a problem. This helps the managers to put lesser

energy to have more gain. It is a formal technique useful where many possible courses of

action are competing for attention. In essence, the problem-solver estimates the benefit

delivered by each action, then selects a number of the most effective actions that deliver a

total benefit reasonably close to the maximal possible one.


Simple AHP hierarchy with associated default priorities

Pareto analysis is a creative way of looking at causes of

problems because it helps stimulate thinking and organize thoughts. Analysis can be used to

identify the root causes of the problems. While it is common to refer to pareto as "80/20" rule,

under the assumption that, in all situations, 20% of causes determine 80% of problems, this

ratio is merely a convenient rule of thumb and is not nor should it be considered immutable

law of nature.

“The Pareto principle (also known as the 80-20 rule,[1] the law of the vital few, and

the principle of factor sparsity) states that, for many events, roughly 80% of the effects come

from 20% of the causes.”

Pareto charts can be used,

During quality control to analyze the causes of defects and failures

When you want to focus your resources on few important items from a large list of

possibilities

To tell the story that attacking problem A might be better than solving problem C,

D and F

Pareto analysis has great practical uses for almost anyone in a managerial role.It is

one of the 7 QC tools and the graph prepared by it is called Pareto chart which

facilitates easy understanding and quick decision making.

This tool can also be used in our project to understand the relative importance of

new and existing customers.This will allow the higher management to better

understand the level of resources and time to be allotted to each of the

customers.The future perspective would be to select and retain customers out of

many options.

Relation Diagram – The purpose of relations diagram is to generate a visual representation

of the relations between an effect and its causes as well as the interrelationship between the

causes in complex problems.


As mentioned in the opening paragraph of the chapter, the

structure of relations diagram is not very rigid; it is quite flexible. Only thing fixed about the

diagram is a bold bordered rectangle in which the ‘effect’ is written. The causes are entered in

light rectangles and lines are drawn to show relation between the rectangles. The lines have

arrows at one end showing which is the cause and which is the effect - the arrow always

leading from the cause to the effect. The most common shape the diagram takes has the

‘effect’ at the centre, with immediate causes surrounding it and secondary and tertiary causes

as outer layers. Relations diagram can be applied to explore cause and effect relationships,

especially in complex situations where the causes are likely to be mutually related. The most

common use is in problem solving to identify multiple interrelated causes. The output of the

tool is a list of root causes for the problem with some indication of their relative importance.

The output has to be considered as only an indication of the relative importance of the causes.

Priority of corrective actions to eliminate the causes should be based on the data

collected, not on output of relations diagram. The output of relations diagram is based on the

perception of the members of the group brainstorming the issue; it needs to be supported by

facts. While the output is important as it points a direction to data collection efforts, it is no


substitute for facts and data.

Tree Diagram –It is one of the new 7 QC tools widely used in decision making. A tree

diagram is often used to discover the steps needed to solve a given problem. It always the

user(s) to gain further insight into the problem and helps the team focus on specific tasks to

complement the tasks at hand to solve the problem.

The purpose of the tree diagram is to explore ways and means to achieve an objective,

develop a list of alternate means to reach the desired situation in a sequential order and to

present them in a visual form. The diagram can be made in 2 forms – Tree or Cascade. It

allows the managers to have the concise and compact view of the problem. The most

important application of the tree diagram is for devising solutions for problems. It helps one

to develop a systematic step by step strategy to achieve an objective. It is also useful in

monitoring the implementation of solutions by taking care of accomplishment of means at

different levels.

The steps in the procedure to develop a tree diagram are :

Identify a high priority problem that needs to be solved at the earliest.

Prepare an objective statement describing the desired situation or the target solution.

Decide the appropriate form of the diagram - cascade or tree as well as direction of

flow. Place the target solution in the dark rectangle.

Identify the primary means to achieve the objective. Arrange them in an appropriate

order keeping in mind the likely interrelations between them and place them in

rectangles at the first level.

For each of the primary means, identify secondary means which would be necessary to

attain those means. Arrange them in next level boxes.

Identify tertiary means required to attain each of the secondary means and place them

in a proper order in the next level boxes.

Continue the process till the group feels that the end of the line has been reached.

Reach a consensus on the relative importance of the last level means to priorities

action.


Let’s take an instance of case of improving health in a

village.

Improving Health Standards in Village- Tree Diagram Cascade form (Example)

The beauty of this tool is the way it makes the steps required to solve a critical

problem too simple to understand. It doesn’t only facilitate decision making but also makes it

lucid for even subordinates to be familiar with the things to be done


Improve

Health

Open Clinic

Medical Degree Medical

College

Pass Entrance Expert Coaching

Organize Fund

This simple but effective figure very clearly defines the

path to be followed to accomplish the ultimate task of improving health.

Tree diagram can also be used in our project work to come up with a path way to solve

our problem to dispose off Silica. I have attempted to develop a tree diagram after talking to

various people of various departments which is shown in later section of the report.

Chapter - 4

Methodology


This is the most crucial part of the project work which

defines the approach and gave me opportunity to understand the end to end functioning

from production process to supply chain. To have an integrated and holistic view to

generate a feasible solution, proper understanding was quite necessary which was

achieved by step to step process as described below:

4.1 Understanding

Before jumping into developing the supply chain of the product, it is very important to

have an in depth knowledge of what we are producing. This plant is fully integrated and

one of its kind in country which produces high performing optical fibers. It is very

important to understand that fibers are nothing but glass but of varying refractive index as

per requirement. The notable point here is that fibers are very sophisticated product and

needs extremely pure glass (99.9999%).

The principle in which it works is Total Internal Reflection. This phenomenon takes

place inside the core of the fiber. This fact makes it very crucial for the core to be virtually

out of any impurity. The clad which covers the fiber is not as critical and little less pure

glass may be employed but not less than 99.99 %(approx.) pure.

Glass is nothing but silica(SiO2) but GeO2 is added with it to increase the refractive

index of the core to facilitate the process of TIR while the clad is pure silica. The thing to


be highlighted here is that clad is made from silica made in-

house which comes from reaction of SiCl4 with oxygen and hydrogen. But, core must be

highly pure which requires specially imported raw material.

The process goes like the Silica is allowed to deposit on the rod and then transformed

to glass thermally. The problem lies on the fact that not every silica is deposited on it and

some amount gets escaped which is collected in jumbo bags after made to pass through

scrubber. We get that bye product silica in the form of white powder.

We need to understand that our input as well as bye product is silica only. It’s just the

undiposited silica which needs to be disposed off. But, problem lies on the fact that it

doesn’t remain as pure as input silica. The first obvious direction to search for the

sustainable solution was to look for the scope of reusing this silica in our main or some

alternate product. So, I discussed with the research people to sort out the problem if

feasible. It should be mentioned here that Sterlite, Aurangabad has a state of art research

facility.

4.2 Research & Development

I got to know that the most common type of fiber made here and demanded universally is

G.652 D. Some special kinds are also made if required. They are G652DE, G.655 (DOF) ,

G.657 A1 , G.657 A2, G.657 B3 and few more. On discussing about the scope of reusing

the undeposited silica, the opportunity seems to be absurd. The reason being the

requirement of any kind of fiber goes as high as 99.9999 % and we have barely 99.65 %

( approx.) Pure silica completely ruling out the possibility of reusing the bye product in

our own plant.

Even the outer cladding cannot be made using impure silica. Moreover, there is no

possibility of using it in near future. This was the clear indication that I would have to find

some other alternative to dispose it in a profitable and sustainable way.


4.3 Production

In my quest to understand more about our bye product, I visited the Production

department where the mixture of bye products i.e. Silica and HCL is passed through a

scrubber which removes the acid and silica is stored in jumbo bags. On examining, I

found it to be snow white powder in appearance.

Had discussion with few people working there and got informed about some burning

issues regarding the bye-product silica –

We don’t have full specification, only few sample tests are available

There is no way to control quality

Test reports are not latest

On further query, understood the possibility of hindrance in our main product, if we

try to control the quality of bye product. This along with above three issues made it

even difficult to convince a third party to use it as input in their plants. The possibility

of after processing is discussed later after understanding the scope of improvement in

quality. Nevertheless, I got the test reports from them, two of them are shown below:



This test report is pertaining to Jan, 2013 and the result is

reasonably good with 99.65% silica and minimal quantity of other impurities.

But, if we look into the latest report of this year and critically analyze it, it is readily

visible that the Iron content has significantly increased up to more than 0.5% as shown in

second report in next page:

Fe2O3 = 0.50524%

This actually is an issue which reduces its applicability in industries.

Following are the points which I found while talking about my concern to production

people-

The Iron content is more due to corroded pipelines

Pipelines get corroded frequently due to acidic nature of bye product

I proposed the possibility of getting pipelines painted

Got informed about the hindrance it will product on normal working of plant

After this, only the possibility of after processing was left. It is obvious to employ

magnetic separator for the purpose. Before that, I again visited the R&D center for further

insight and also searched online. The common conclusion was that if magnetic impurities

are relatively bigger then this method works else not.



4.4 Earlier Attempt

Actually, an attempt was already made to remove the iron particles but with not great success.

By employing that method following results were found-

Iron content – 900 ppm

Reduced to – 600 ppm

Industry requirement – 200 ppm

P.S. – values are approximate not exact.

And, setting up new machinery would also incur extra cost. So, I decided to study the

specification of the requirements of different industries and mapped it with our product.

There are so many applications of silica in different industries as shown below:

Dental Silica – Silica is used in formulation of toothpaste as thickening agent. It is

responsible to impart desirable aesthetic to the product. The optical property like

transparency and opaqueness can be control as per requirement by playing with the

amount of silica. Toothpaste industry is vast in India with a number of big and small

players. I focused on the supplier of these players who may further process our

product if required to make it suitable for toothpaste industry. Huber engineered

material is one of those suppliers which has shown positive response.

Anti-Caking and free flow agent – Moisture, Pressure and Temperature are three

factors which adversely affect powders and granules. In moisture, caking of particles

is a big problem. Silica not only prevents this but also acts as a free flow agent. It is

widely used in food industry because of the above properties. Followings are its uses

as mentioned in Huber’s website –

o Prevent caking

o Improve flow and increase packaging rates

o Reduce or eliminate build up in spray drying operations


o Decrease Dusting

o Eliminate lumps

o Efficiently absorb liquids, fats, and oils for powdered food applications

o Decrease clogging and bridging during production

Silica Paints - It is one another sector which widely uses silica. It is used as

thickener and provides opacity to paint. Titanium dioxide is being used recently but

silica compound proves to be apt to extent TiO2 in white paint. Untreated precipitated

silica reduces the gloss of coatings. In solvent-based coatings, it also increases

viscosity for settling resistance. In clear coatings such as lacquer or varnish, it offers

exceptionally high clarity and transparency.

Animal feeding - Silica and silicates are used in animal health and nutrition

formulations as anti-caking and free-flow agents and as carriers for liquid to powder

conversions. Caking and lumping are few common problems which are generally

encountered during production, processing and storage of animal food. The affinity of

silica towards moisture makes it suitable to be used to as agent to convert liquid to

semi-solid.

Pesticide – This is one of the most important uses of silica which shows high

promise and scope in future. The industry of pesticide is ever increasing and

demanding. India being an agricultural economy is the high consumer of pesticides. It

is the high time to conserve our environment. And that is the reason , non-toxic

pesticides are being promoted worldwide. Silica has emerged as very good alternative

to toxic and harmful pesticides and insecticides due to its inert nature. It kills insect

not chemically but physically. It makes the surface rough for insect and hurt them to


death. Another mechanism is it absorbs water and dry it by

destroying

the outer protective layer of insect leading it to its death. Moreover, Silica is very inert

and doesn’t react very easily with its surrounding which makes it safe for the

environment. Recently, the use of silica as insecticide has been promoted as

environmental friendly. This is actually the most important industry which we may

focus on. I have done a case study on this which is in the later part of the report.

Silica is also used as a passive and carrying agent in pesticide formation. For

improvement in the suspension power and as a carrier for the active ingredients,

especially malathion, acephate and isoproton based formulations.

Rubber – Silica is used as additive in rubber industry. It is used in making of rubber

sleeper, conveyor and transmission belt , PVC sheet , railway pads, silicon tube ,

rubber hoses , rubber and solid tyres. In short , silica is present in every big and small

things which we come across in our daily life. Its usage varies from small rubber

bands to bigger rubber parts.

Paper – Silica is used as a thickening and suspending agent, to prevent set off and

picking, to heighten brilliance.

Above mentioned were few most important uses of silica but surely not limited to

them. We may think in direction of product development to make our product suitable

for above mention uses. Every industry has its own requirement with different crucial

parameters. But, one major flaw which pops up every now and then is the amount of

iron in the form of Fe2O3 in our silica. If we have a look at the specification of silica

which is produced by our new customer MLA group , same thing comes as outcome.



They supply silica to different industries like paper, food, adhesives, paints etc.

But, their silica has not more than 0.3% iron while ours has about 0.5%.

This clearly indicates that we need to search for the most apt industry to focus for our

product. So, I have done a small case study with a sole view to search a market for our

product.

4.5 Case Study: Industry to focus

4.5.1 Few Facts:


Agrochemical Industry size in estimated to be US$ 3.8 billion in year 2012

Expected to grow at 12-13% per annum to reach 7.0 billion

Domestic demand growth rate = 8-9% and export demand at 15-16%

Maharashtra is among top Insecticide users

Silica product is used as insecticide which constitutes the major portion of agro-chemical

consumption.

4.5.2 Research Paper

A research paper by LAING M D, GATARAYIHA M C and ADANDONON A on

SILICON USE FOR PEST CONTROL IN AGRICULTURE has the following abstract which

signifies the importance of silica in agriculture:

“Silicon (Si) deficiency in crops has been recognized since the 1970s, and a

substantial body of research, particularly on rice and sugarcane, now shows that silicon is a

‘functional’ plant nutrient. In particular, silicon application can significantly enhance insect

pest and disease resistance in plants, with consequent yield increases. Responses to silicon

application in reducing pest populations and plant damage are usually more obvious in

susceptible than resistant varieties. Silicon depositions in monocots may provide a mechanical

barrier against insect pests. However, this passive role of silicon is now being contested, and

an active role of silicon has been shown in the physiological resistance of crops to diseases.


Silicon is now considered to have a catalytic role in the expression of physiological

resistance through the production of, among other chemicals, tannic and phenol compounds.

The application of silicon in crops provides a viable component of integrated management of

insect pests and diseases because it leaves no pesticide residues in food or the environment,

and it can be easily integrated with other pest management practices, including biological

control.”

4.5.3 Silica – Applications:

Inert carrier in dry concentrates

Dry pesticides

An anti-caking agent

Soil conditioner and turf

Soil supplement

P.S. – As per ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY, OFFICE OF PESTICIDE

PROGRAMS, WASHINGTON, D.C.

4.5.4 Maharashtra – Limitless Possibilities:

Maharashtra produces ample opportunity for pesticide usage for its famous fruit zones shown

under-


Table 3 – Fruit Zones of Maharashtra

4.5.5 TWO WAYS TO APPROACH:1) Directly partnering with fruit growers – Selling our silica to small players, wholesaler

or farmers.


2) Partnering with major pesticide players – Supplying silica

as vendor to major players.

List of major players-

UPL

Bayer Crop Science

Syngenta

Rallis India

BASF

Few things to note:

There are 30-40 large players and 400 formulators

Silica is renowned as non-toxic pesticide

Silica Pesticide is extensively used in arid/dry region

I found something very interesting


Opportunity

Expansion of contract farming

Growing Farmer Awareness

Threat

Existing Players

A UK based company “Pest Control Direct” has a product

Agrodust which seems to have mainly silica.

Below is the snapshot of the same, directly showing ‘silica’ in bracket.

On enquiring them about the composition of this product so that we can sort out

whether any processing is required to use our silica as pesticide or not, the reply which I got is

quoted below:

“Agrodust contains silicon dioxide, a mined product, with no added ingredients (any

impurities are from natural ground minerals). It is labeled as a powder, with a crystalline/

granular nature of appearance, similar to salt or sugar. It is an inert product and kills insects

by physical means (rather than chemical/ biochemical).”


They also sent me MSDS which shows the composition of

Silica as 60 to 100 %.Our product comes well in this range of purity. It is shown below:

4.5.6 Conclusion:

Pesticide industry promises a great market for our Silica.


Chapter - 5

Data Collection and Execution

After studying the above industries, I prepared the list of companies and contacts of

the responsible personnel of each. An excel file is prepared with approx. 350 company’s

contact under different industries. Three modes of communication were used to put the

proposal to the executives of the companies – E-mail, On-line Form and phone. Specification

of our product was sent to them. Few of them showed interest but due to no requirement or

unmatched requirement, business talks could not be continued with them. But, as a result of


CeremicsGlassCementPesticidesPharmaPorcelainAdhesiveChemicalPaintMarbleSolar Cell

Identified the industries where silica is used

constant and vigorous effort, three major breakthrough came to our

way when we got three parties with similar requirement and positive business talk were

realized with them.

5.1 New Customers

5.1.1 MLA Group of Industry – It is a chemical company which mostly deals in B2B business

and acts as supplier of important chemicals to industries like rubber / other polymers, paints &

coatings, insecticides / pesticides, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, feedstuff and numerous other

industries. Their product range consists of various precipitated chemicals and functional

fillers, both synthetic and naturally occurring processed minerals including Precipitated Silica,

Hydrated Calcium Silicate, Aluminium Silicate, Zinc Stearate, Calcium Stearate, Calcium

Sulphate, Zinc-oxide active/transparent, Levigated / Surface treated China Clays, Micronized

Calcite, Dolomite, Talc etc.

They have clients like Unilever, Asian Paints , Berger Paints , Nicco Cables are few to

name. The thing to be noted here is that they had also shown concerns about the black iron

particles in our silica and still found it suitable for certain uses.

They have already sent the foc Purchase order of 200 kg.

5.1.2 Huber Engineered Materials (HEM) – They manufacture and supply inorganic

materials designed to enhance the performance, appeal and processing of a broad range of

products used in industrial, paper and consumer-based applications. They have specialty in

chemicals like precipitated silica and silicates, alumina trihydrate, magnesium hydroxide,

molybdates, processed nutritional ingredients, barium sulfate and industrial, food grade and

USP calcium carbonate. They are also a chemical company which serves other businesses.

They were showing very positive response after judging our test report and asked for a large

amount of sample of 3 kg so that they can evaluate it for various applications.


5.1.3 Supersil Chemicals - Supersil Chemicals (I) Pvt. Ltd is one of

the largest producer of precipitated silica in India. Their product is used in various industrial

applications. They

specialize in various grades of silica used in rubber and non-rubber industries. A half

kilogram sample has been sent to them.

5.2 Observation

It is very interesting to see that above companies share same profile as manufacturer and

supplier of chemicals involved in B2B business. This signifies that the probability of

converting these types of customer is higher rather than directly approaching to silica using

firms.

5.3 Integrating the Supply chain

We have 6 existing and 3 perspective new customers for our bye product Silica. Getting the

customers and optimizing the supply chain to maximize the gain are two different things. I

studied the whole disposal system and used some managerial tools to analyze the present

process and ways to improve it. Followings are the tools used:

5.3.1 Pareto Analysis – This is done to get the major source of revenue as far as customers are

concerned. We presently have 6 customers. I have generated the template with assumed data

due to confidential required data. Revenue, net profit or any other criteria can be feed into

template for analysis as require in future. Space is also provided to accommodate new

potential customers as a result of this project.

The analysis is shown in next page.


Figure 4 – Pareto Chart

The cut-off line of 0.8 shows the range of 80-20 rule as per customers.

5.3.2 AHP (Analytic hierarchy process) – This tool is used for customer assessment and to

rank them as per their net value. Revenue and proximity have been considered as criteria. And

respective rating of all the 6 existing customers has been done. The tree diagram is shown

below:


Customer Assessment

0.5 0.5

Finding the weight age of customers in term of proximity:

Pair wise matrix

1 2 3 4 5 6

1 1 0.33 0.2 9 0.2 0.2

2 3 1 0.33 9 0.33 0.33

3 5 3 1 9 1 1

4 0.11 0.11 0.11 1 0.11 0.11

5 5 3 1 9 1 1

6 5 3 1 9 1 1Figure 5 – Pairwise Matrix

where 1 to 6 are the existing customer. The rating has been given on the basis of distance and

on the scale of 1 to 9 - 1 being least and 9 being most superior. Detailed analysis has been

shown in excel.

Customers Weight

1 0.07

2 0.12

3 0.26


Proximity Revenue

4 0.02

5 0.26

6 0.26

Similarly, we can get the rating on the basis of revenue with actual data. Our tree diagram

looks like this:

:

Figure 6 – Tree diagram of Customer Assessment

Thereafter, a simple matrix multiplication will give the ranking of our customers on the basis

of proximity and revenue as shown:


It must be noted that cost of serving the customers has not been considered. According

to literature, first benefit is determined and then ratio of it with cost is taken to come up with

Benefit/Cost ratio.

We will need to normalize the cost to get the weight age as shown in demo below:


Table 7 – Normalized cost

Now, the benefit-cost ratio can be calculated to come up with final weight age.

5.3.3 Relation Diagram – It is one of the new 7 QC qualitative tools which has been used to

depict the interrelated causes pertaining to the problem of unsold Silica.


No Quality Control

Rusted Pipelines Inferior Quality

No After-processing

Figure 6 – Relation Diagram

Inference- Inferior quality seems to be the root problem pertaining to unsold silica.

5.3.4 Tree Diagram – This new quality tool gives a systematic approach to solve a defined

problem. The causes as shown in the relation diagram above need to be solved strategically

following the well-defined path. An attempt has been made by me, based on my

understanding in last two month to come up with the steps to solve this silica problem. It is

shown in next page:


Unsold Silica

Install MachineAfter-Processing

Figure 8 - Tree Chart

Chapter - 6

Conclusion and Scope for Future Work


Sell Silica

Iron Removing

Improve Quality

Higher Management

Approval

Cross-Functional Team

Integrated

Approach

6.1 Conclusion

3 new customers found

Sustainable net profit achieved

Root cause of the problem understood

Relative value of the customers analyzed

Tree Diagram prepared to explore means to achieve the objective of disposing

complete Silica.

6.2 Future Scope

Further research on alternative ways to improve quality of Silica

Possibility of using advanced magnetic separator to lower Iron content

Developing a standard specification and quality control measures

Academic Contribution


Applied AHP and Pareto analysis

Usage of new 7 Quality Control tools like Relation and Tree Diagram

Excel models with numerous formulae were developed for assessment of the

customers

Professional Contribution

Initiated business talk with perspective customers

Coordinated and acted as SPOC between company and outside parties

References


Research Paper:Proc S Afr Sug Technol Ass (2006), SILICON USE FOR PEST CONTROL IN

AGRICULTURE LAING M D, GATARAYIHA M C and ADANDONON A , 278-279

Links:

http://www.epa.gov/oppsrrd1/REDs/factsheets/4081fact.pdf

http://www.hubermaterials.com/products/silica-and-silicates.aspx

http://npic.orst.edu/factsheets/degen.html

http://www.indiaprwire.com/pressrelease/agriculture/20131118267585.htm

http://npic.orst.edu/factsheets/inerts.html

http://www.gardenguides.com/89104-organic-controls-fruit-tree-diseases.html

http://www.pestcontroldirect.co.uk/acatalog/

Agrodust__1kg__silica___one_free_mask.html

http://www.crystallinesilica.eu/content/what-respirable-crystalline-silica-rcs

http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newTED_01.htm last accessed 11-10-2011

http://chandoo.org/wp/2009/09/02/pareto-charts/

http://www.productivity.in/knowledgebase/TQM/c.%20Tools%20and

%20Techniques/3.3%207%20New%20QC%20Tools/7%20New%20QC%20Tools.pdf

http://qualitytale.blogspot.in/2009/07/new-7-qc-tools-of-quality-tree-diagram.html

http://www.hubermaterials.com/products/silica-and-silicates.aspx

http://www.precipitatedsilica.net/applications.html

http://www.ficci.com/events/20563/add_docs/sectorbrief.pdf

http://news.agropages.com/News/NewsDetail---10649.htm

Appendices



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