Alloys and Metals Pvt. Ltd., Indore was established by Kartik Jain in the year 2000, with the vision to cater to the needs of the booming Steel Industry. The company started with the manufacturing of Ingots – a steel product, which served as an input for production process in Hot Rolling Mills. The manufacturing unit was situated at Pithampur, an industrial zone where the government offered several incentives, rebates and subsidized electricity. Over 20 years of experience in steel trading business prompted Kartik and his brother to invest their own capital to set up this unit. Later on, they took financial assistance from Indian Overseas Bank. His brother supervised production at the manufacturing unit whereas he concentrated on acquiring suppliers, marketing and distribution of the product. Initially, when they entered into the business, the demand far exceeded the supply, and this attracted those to enter the market. The manufacturing unit employed 150 workers; out of which 80 percent were on contract basis while the rest were wage holders. They worked in two shifts of nine hours each, and the plant was shut down for six hours daily. The company had introduced a number of innovative HR policies to keep motivation and morale of its workers high. They paid overtime for extra hours put in by the employees. This considerably reduced employee absenteeism and turnover. The company provided group insurance under the Employee State Insurance Scheme (ESI) and all other safety measures for their benefits. The production capacity was 80 tones per day. The company manufactured Ingots of various sizes (3”- 4”, 3.25” – 4.25”, 3.50” – 4.50”) as per the requirement of the customers. The manufacturing unit was prone to accidents as the Ingots were manufactured at temperatures as high as 17000c. Maintenance of such high temperature required heavy power consumption and the expenditure on power was only approx. rs.50-60 Lakhs per months. The company had also ser up a waste recycling plant at Pithampur as on an average 10 percent of the material was wasted. The recycled product was then further used as raw material.

Steel scrap, used to produce Ingots was purchased locally from Shree Gears Pvt. Ltd., Dewas Steel India Ltd., Dewas, and T-Tee Industries Pvt. Ltd. Dewas. They also imported the same from various countries like South Africa, Britain and Thailand. The firm had big cost disadvantage when it came to procurement of raw materials. Due to the quality nature of the supplier base, the firm funds it extremely difficult to maintain the quality and consistency of raw material.