Speaking to The Financial Express, executive director, Tata Tea, M H Ashraff said that the company's R&D centre is working towards enhancing its brand portfolio and is conducting tests on various products so as to meet the tastes of the different consumer segments.

Giving details about the new value-added products being developed by Tata Tea, Ashraff claims that to start with, the company will be marketing these products abroad, where there is a greater demand for such products.

``However, at the same time, Tata Tea would also study the demand for these value-added products in the Indian market and based on the response, the company will consider launching them in the domestic market also at a later stage,'' he added.

Ashraff disclosed that the flavoured tea has already been successfully test-marketed abroad and has been launched in foreign markets through the extensive Tata Tetley network. These teas comes in various flavours such as orange tea, lemon'n'lime, peppermint, Earl Grey, cinnamon and cardamom, he said.

``We are still not certain about the exact time frame for the launch of these products in India. I don't say that there is no demand for these products in the domestic market, as Hindustan Lever has already done it under its `Tiger' brand. But in order to introduce these products successfully in the domestic market, we have to adopt a careful approach and we are currently studying such possibilities,'' he added.

The value-added products are being developed at the company's experimental manufacturing units at Bangalore, Munnar and Teok. Ashraff informed that at its R&D centres at Munnar and Teok, efforts were on to produce high-yielding quality clones. He added that using the techniques of conventional selection and hybridisation many new clones and seed stocks have been developed and were being tested in the field. Yield potential of some of the new tea clones is 8000-10,000 kg/ hectare under best field conditions.

"The tea manufacturing and packeting facilities of the company are the best in the country and efforts are on to further upgrade and modernise these facilities in a phased manner with the latest technology and equipment. Experimental manufacturing units at Munnar and Teok are constantly working towards improving the manufacturing process and efficiency of operations and studies on changes in quality during processing are carried out regularly. Our brands cater to the entire spectrum of consumers in a country as diverse as ours in addition to the markets in the USA, Europe and Middle East", he added.

Tata Tea spent Rs 4.64 crore on R&D in 1999 which was 0.51 per cent of its turnover. The R&D outlay is expected to go up to 0.65 per cent of total turnover in the next two to three years.