Possession of a rare combination of industry know-how and business acumen has propelled Bhadresh K Shah, Managing Director, AIA Engineering Ltd, to the pinnacle of success.

Bhadresh Shah has come a long way since he began making small alloy castings more than thirty years back in 1976 when he was a fresh graduate in metallurgical engineering from IIT Kanpur. Within three years he founded Ahmedabad Induction Alloys Pvt Ltd to manufacture steel, alloy steel, and alloy iron castings used in the cement, mining, and thermal power generation industries.

He early realized that an overseas tie-up was the best way to gain valuable industry know-how and signed up collaboration with Magotteaux of Belgium in 1991. The Belgian company set up Magotteaux India Pvt Ltd, a joint venture, which was later merged into Ahmedabad Induction Alloys as the foreign company decided to leave India.
But, refusing to be bogged down, Shah inked a deal for technical collaboration with South Western Corporation (SWC) of the US in 1999. In May 2001 he re-christened the company as AlA Engineering.

Growth and business stability
Today, AIAE boasts a wide range of blue-chip clients from the cement and mining sectors that includes Aditya Birla Group’s Ultratech, ACC, Gujarat Ambuja, and the Kudremukh Iron Ore Company. The thermal power industries almost exclusively rely on the products of AIAE.