Faced with innumerable challenges, COVID-19 has caught the world off-guard. Frontline workers, healthcare officials and caregivers were unprepared to handle the wave of uncertainty that hit us. As a result of the pandemic, the “new normal” demands that we focus our efforts towards health, hygiene and safety to ensure a better tomorrow.

THE IDEOLOGY

Piramal Nextgen Industries Private Limited, part of the Chinai Piramal Group, has picked up the baton to aid our everyday heroes. Started in 1990, the group, spearheaded by Alpana Piramal Chinai and Samir Chinai, has grown manifold over the last decade with several new businesses being added to the group portfolio.

‘ACE DEFENCE’, manufactures N95 Masks and Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) in the heart of Mumbai, India. Helmed by Arjun Chinai, the project was conceptualized and ready-to-produce in less than 60 days. The groups other business interests include Architecture, Turnkey Contracting, Interior Design, Educational Institutions and Retail.

The brand, Ace Defence, is the brainchild of young entrepreneur, Arjun Chinai, a Cathedral & John Connon School alumnus who graduated from the University of Warwick. The idea to set up their own medical facility was born when the management went out to purchase N95 masks when the pandemic hit India, and realised the poor quality of goods available, as well as number of counterfeit goods prevalent in the market.

Deeply disturbed by the fact that these counterfeit goods were being supplied to frontline workers and hospitals, they decided to set up the N95 medical mask manufacturing facility. Ace Defence endeavours to help reduce the shortage of N95 masks and make them widely available to every strata of soceity across the country.

Piramal Nextgen is one of the fastest-growing medical consumables companies in the country. The company has recently expanded its production capacity, with a brand new factory, as well as another fully automatic N95 machine. With this new acquisition, the capacity has more than doubled, to approximately 1.5 lakh N95 masks per day. Piramal Nextgen is proud to continue to rise to the occasion, and help India battle the second wave.

THE INSPIRATION

Inspired by Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi’s campaign of “Aatmanirbhar”, the company is supplying high quality masks at affordable rates. The Ace Defence medical facility is one of India’s largest N95 mask manufacturing units with state-of-the-art technology and a manufacturing capacity of 70,000 N95 masks per day, equivalent to 1 mask every 1.3 seconds.

The Ace Defence N95 5-layer non-collapsible face mask is produced on a fully automatic machine. It is one of the first fully automatic machines in the country. A fully automatic machine is enables minimal human handling, which leads to better hygiene and superior quality stitching.

The mask differentiates itself from other masks available in the market today, by being a five- layered mask that boasts of BFE (filtration efficiency) above 99.5%. The company also manufactures antimicrobial coveralls (PPE Suits), which are DRDO approved.

The company endeavours to provide personal protective equipment that is affordable, yet uncompromising on the strictest, global quality standards. It is BIS (Bureau of Indian Standards), WHO-GMP and ISO certified and is compliant with FFP2 (CE), FDA & NIOSH Standards.

Keeping in line with the company’s ethos of generating value for society at large, the Chinai Piramal group has donated 10,000 Ace Defence N95 masks to the Government of Maharashtra to aid their untiring efforts to keep Maharashtra safe.