Given most of the accidents occurring on the moving walkway were related to slipping or skidding of the shopping cart, Lotte Mart came up with a new “wire flame spraying process” to keep slipping on the surface of the moving walkway to a minimum.(image:Lotte Mart)
SEOUL, Oct. 31 (Korea Bizwire) – From now on, large retail establishments such as discount outlets and department stores do not have to spend fortunes to replace their moving walks regularly. Lotte Mart said on October 30 that it has applied for a patent for an escalator and moving walkway pallet processed for extra traction for the first time in Korea. With this technology, the cost to replace the moving walkway is expected to be reduced by 80 percent.
According to the Korea Elevator Safety Institute, there are more than 500,000 elevators, escalators, and moving walkways in Korea as of the end of 2013. For the past five years between 2009 and 2013, an average of 100 safety accidents occurred in a year. Of these, 80 percent of accidents happened in retail outlets, which must compensate for losses even if the accident was caused by the victim’s carelessness.
Given most of the accidents occurring on the moving walkway were related to slipping or skidding of the shopping cart, Lotte Mart came up with a new “wire flame spraying process” to keep slipping on the surface of the moving walkway to a minimum. The patented technology makes use of a special-metal coating material. According to results of a test conducted by a certified testing agency, the new material’s degree of hardness is 4.5 times higher than that of the existing walkway surface, 36 percent higher in friction, and 2.4 times higher in slip resistance.
Currently Korea’s large-scale discount outlets have five sets of moving walkways on average. If all of these 400 or so stores adopt the new technology, the total savings would be about 240 billion won in ten years. In this case, Lotte Mart will be able to earn a royalty income of 2 billion won a year.
By Sean Chung (schung10@koreabizwire.com)
