Entrepreneur develops electric chapati maker

Hyderabad: A J Rao, 47, a resident of Balanagar, has developed any innovative product to ease the process of making chapatis. The product has a chapati roller, manual heated press to pre-cook chapatis and an automated version of the heated press.

The first prototype that was made by the innovator took around 3-4 months costing him around Rs 4 lakh. To generate such an amount was a challenging task for him. With no support for funds, Rao took money on interest from a former colleague. To make the end product run without any hitches, many trials were conducted and after full satisfaction, it was launched in the market. Presently it is being sold online.

Speaking to the Hans India, Rao said, "To develop such an innovative product, it is very important to have patience and confidence in oneself. Getting funds for a new product is also a challenge. My customers always asked me for such a product that could make it easy to prepare chapatis. The functional requirements to develop the roti maker were given to me by my first customer and my prior knowledge in designing and machines helped me to develop the product."

"There are three models of the roti maker and each has a different price ranging from Rs 5,400 to Rs 7,500 depending on the requirements of customer. The machine weighs nearly 10 kg and consumes only 1-2 units of power," added Rao. The machine can prepare chapatis according to customer's preferences of thickness and size.

Presently, the product is being sold online.

"Along with Sai Manikanta Innovations Enterprise, Hyderabad, I could manage to bring out this innovation to the market. Other people demanded to get paid around 60-70% of the profit. So this was therefore done by me alone. The main aim was to make the people know about the innovations rather than earning money through innovations."