ASM 2026: Murali foresees Dispensing, Tank Weighing & Check Weighing—Next Industrial Verticals
There is a particular kind of quiet confidence that belongs to the engineer who has spent years building something — not presenting it, not selling it, but actually building it, testing it, troubleshooting it at 11 PM when a customer’s installation throws an unexpected error. When Murali Krishna Veeramallu, Head of Production at Smart Labtech Private Limited, walked up to present at the afternoon session of ASM 2026, that quiet confidence filled the room before he had spoken a word.
His presentation — Smart Industrial Products — was a 33-slide, hour-long deep dive into one of the most strategically significant chapters in Smart Labtech’s Silver Jubilee story: the company’s growing capability as an indigenous manufacturer of precision industrial weighing systems, and its expanding vision for the connected, compliant, industrial-scale weighing solutions of tomorrow.
It was technical. It was detailed. And for those willing to follow it, it was genuinely impressive.
A Manufacturing Story That Began in 2013
Murali opened with a history slide that deserves to be read carefully — because it is the biography of Smart Labtech’s manufacturing ambition told in milestones:
2013 — Model approvals received for platform scales in the name of Metsar Technologies, the group’s sister concern. 2019 — The actual era of in-house assembly begins. 2020 — In-house design development initiated. 2021 — Platform scales with improved aesthetics developed. 2022 — Model approvals applied for under the SMART brand itself. 2026 — Skilled Labour Certificate received in the name of management.
The cumulative result of this thirteen-year journey: 803 units in order intake, 753 scales supplied, 638 installations completed — and counting. These are not imported instruments rebranded for the Indian market. These are instruments conceived, designed, assembled, and installed by a team in Balanagar, Hyderabad — carrying the SMART name and the weight of twenty-five years of customer trust.
The Platform Scale — India’s Industrial Workhorse, Indigenised
The platform scale is the backbone of industrial weighing — present in every pharmaceutical manufacturing floor, every chemical plant, every food processing unit, every logistics hub. Smart Labtech’s platform scale range covers capacities from 30 kg to 1,500 kg, with four model-approval classes:
Alpha — up to 50 kg, up to 10,000 counts, accuracy at or above 0.1g. Beta — 50 to 5,000 kg, up to 10,000 counts. Gamma — up to 50 kg, up to 30,000 counts. Delta — 50 to 5,000 kg, up to 30,000 counts.
Murali walked the team through the part-number system with the thoroughness of a man who knows that a salesperson who cannot decode a model number cannot quote confidently. The naming convention encodes capacity, accuracy class, platform size, and special zone designation — including FLP (Flameproof) and ATEX variants for hazardous environments.
But what distinguished the presentation from a product catalogue was the engineering texture. Murali described the variants that Smart’s customers have demanded — and that Smart has delivered:
PFA-Coated Platforms — for isolator and oncology environments where acidic chemicals demand corrosion protection beyond stainless steel. The Perfluoroalkoxy coating protects against most acids up to 250°C. More than 10–15 units supplied, with AVRA among the early adopters. Load cell cables in these installations are routed through acid-resistant nylon tubing up to the point of potential acid exposure — a detail that distinguishes a supplier who understands the application from one who merely supplies the hardware.
Tower Lamp Integration — developed for a customer who then moved to a different company (HM Class) — and insisted on Smart balances at the new facility simply because of his familiarity and trust. “He was very fond of our machines,” Murali said, with evident satisfaction. Four balances with tower lamps and software connectivity were subsequently installed at HM Class and are running well.
Low-Floor Platforms — one of the most practically useful innovations in the range. Standard platform heights of 110–130mm require ramps of 600mm to 1 metre for vessel access. Smart’s low-floor design reduces platform height to 45mm, with a ramp of just one foot — saving usable floor space and simplifying operations. An ultra-low-floor version at 28–30mm height has been developed and supplied to a Mumbai customer. The range covers 150 to 1,500 kg.
The 2-Tonne Movable Scale — perhaps the most visually striking product in the presentation. A 2-metre by 2-metre, 2-tonne capacity movable platform scale — designed and built in-house, now sitting on the fourth floor of Smart Labtech’s production facility, and already supplied and installed at a customer site. Credit for the mechanical design was explicitly given to Somaraju, the in-house designer whose ability to translate Murali’s inputs into working engineering drawings was cited with genuine appreciation.
The Indicator Revolution — From Basic to Brilliant
The indicator — the display and control unit of a weighing system — has undergone its own quiet revolution at Smart Labtech. Murali traced the trajectory:
Three years ago, 70% of platform scales were shipped with the SX21S indicator. Today, 85–90% go with the S7 (7-inch colour touchscreen) or S10 (10-inch colour touchscreen) — a shift driven entirely by customer demand for richer connectivity and more flexible data management.
The S7 and S10 indicators now support RS-232, RS-485, Wi-Fi, and Ethernet communications — giving plant-floor weighing systems the connectivity backbone that modern pharmaceutical and industrial operations require. And in FY 2025–26, a series of new capabilities were added to these indicators — each one driven by a specific customer requirement that has since become a standard offering:
Serialised Data Printout — header, data fields, and footer all configurable to customer specification, mirroring the printout format of Sartorius balances that customers are already familiar with.
Calibration Printout — now available on industrial balances for the first time; previously only found on precision analytical instruments from Mettler and Minibia. Configurable with customer name and balance ID.
Single-Key Calibration — one touch button that guides the operator through the calibration sequence step by step, eliminating the need to navigate through password-protected menus. Operator-friendly, error-reducing, and now demonstrated live on video during the presentation.
Sartorius Balance Integration — perhaps the most commercially significant development of the year. Smart Labtech has developed software that connects its S7 or S10 indicator in parallel with a Sartorius analytical balance — allowing operators to enter batch numbers, method names, AR numbers, and other data fields that the Sartorius indicator does not support natively. Tested and validated across Secura, BSA, BCE, BCA, and MCA Sartorius models. The result: customers who have Sartorius balances gain the data management flexibility they need, served through a Smart-built interface. “Our indicator will be a parallel indicator to the balance,” Murali explained.
Multiple Balance Connectivity — one S7 or S10 indicator can now serve multiple balances simultaneously via RS-232, with a common printer output. Particularly valuable in pharmaceutical dispensing rooms where single-printer infrastructure is the norm.
Dual/Remote Indicator — one indicator inside the booth, one outside, both operating simultaneously. Developed for biological safety cabinet environments where the operator’s hands are inside the cabinet and data entry must happen from outside.
SICS Command Integration — the SX23 indicator now supports SICS (Standard Interface Command Set) commands, enabling LIMS and MES connectivity. A Mumbai enquiry using exactly this capability is close to finalisation.
A dedicated electronics developer has also been identified this year for the development of a fully indigenous Smart indicator — reducing dependence on third-party hardware sources entirely. “By next year, I hope we will be having our own indicator,” Murali said.
The Numbers — 48%, 87%, and a Historic Best
The performance figures for Smart Industrial Products in FY 2025–26 were presented without embellishment — because they needed none:
Platform scale units sold: 186 — a 48% increase over the previous year’s 130. Order intake growth: 87% year-on-year. Platform scale revenue: ₹1.99 crore — up from ₹1.06 crore in the previous year. Overall Smart Industrial Products revenue across all verticals: ₹3.6 crore — up from ₹1.3 crore.
Legal Metrology year (January–December) scale numbers: highest in all previous years. Financial year (April–March) scale numbers: highest in all previous years. Gross profit on platform scales: highest in all previous years.
Murali attributed the results directly to the sales team — with Siva Kumar consistently the highest platform scale performer across the last four years, followed by Madhu and Ramana Rao. Aurobindo Pharma leads the customer base with 896 scales in their installed fleet. Gravity holds 71, and Biological E — which has standardised exclusively on the S10 indicator and is progressively replacing all other manufacturers’ indicators with Smart’s S7 — stands as one of the most telling testimonials to product confidence in the field.
Delivery time — historically a vulnerability at 2–3 months — has been dramatically reduced. Standard items now ship in under a week from order confirmation. Customised orders: 2–3 weeks.
The Emerging Verticals — Dispensing, Tank Weighing, Check Weighing
The afternoon session also introduced three product verticals in various stages of development and market establishment:
Dispensing Systems — fully functional installations already running at Bilaspur E since 2019, with configurations ranging from a single platform-plus-Sartorius balance combination to three-balance setups with shared HMI and printer. User access levels, restricted operator menus, audit trail planning, and 21 CFR Part 11 compliance elements are all being built into the software architecture. Lead times are longer due to the customisation-intensive nature of each installation — but the solution is proven and operating in the field.
Tank Weighing Systems — four systems successfully installed at Buildmate, connected to SCADA via Modbus RS-485 using the M25B panel-mount indicator. The system covers horizontal and vertical tank configurations, with load cells supporting up to multi-hundred-tonne capacities using multiple load cells per tank. Key pre-sales requirements — agitator force, tank dimensions, number of legs, safety factor — are all captured through a dedicated questionnaire that Murali has developed and made available to the sales team.
Check Weighers — through a partnership with Vipotec (Germany), Smart Labtech now offers online check weighing systems covering pharmaceutical, food, cosmetics, and logistics applications. These systems include in-feed and out-feed conveyors, weighing conveyors, rejection mechanisms, X-ray inspection, metal detection, and optical inspection — for speeds ranging from single-digit pieces per minute up to 1,000 pieces per minute. 21 CFR Part 11 compliance is available. Murali was candid about the challenges in this vertical — a major enquiry that occupied the team for four to five months without converting — but equally candid that the product’s strength and the partnership’s depth make it a vertical worth sustained investment.
On Going — High Readability and the Next Frontier
In the final developmental segment, Murali introduced perhaps the most technically ambitious project currently underway: the high-readability balance capable of 60,000 divisions — meaning 60 kg weighed to 1 gram accuracy, or 30 kg to 0.5 gram accuracy.
The industry standard specification typically asks for 5–10 grams accuracy at these capacities. Smart Labtech is testing to 1 gram — and the early results, demonstrated in a video taken after 10–15 days of continuous testing, showed a maximum deviation of just 2–3 digits. “We really amazed after seeing the performance,” Murali said. “We didn’t expect that kind of response.”
The 60 kg / 1 gram configuration is validated. The 30 kg / 0.5 gram is under testing. The 100 kg / 1 gram configuration awaits a newly designed platform capable of bearing the load. Target: 2–3 months to full range completion.
The Closer — A Vote of Thanks That Said Everything
The day’s proceedings were wrapped by Ms. Chinnara, whose vote of thanks captured the afternoon’s spirit precisely: Murali Krishna had given the team not just product knowledge, but application knowledge — the practical intelligence of someone who has installed these systems, debugged them, improved them, and stood behind them.
“His session provided useful insights into how these scales ensure accuracy and efficiency in measuring loads,” she said, “making it easier to understand their real-world importance.”
For Smart Labtech — a company that has spent twenty-five years earning the right to carry the world’s best instruments into India’s laboratories — the afternoon of 15th April 2026 was a reminder that it is also building instruments of its own. Instrument by instrument. Customer by customer. Milestone by milestone.
Made in Balanagar. Trusted across India.
Naresh Theegutla
