What is an AIR?
AIR stands for Authorized Indian Representative and describes the local representative of a foreign company who wants to certify and distribute its products in India. Such a local representative is required by all Indian certifications and the requirements for in each certification type are slightly different.
What does the AIR do?
The AIR must be a legal person within India and must take legal responsibility for the certification of the foreign company. Therefore, in some cases (BIS ISI), a bank guarantee of $10,000 is required from foreign manufacturers if, after certification has been completed, the manufacturer violates the templates of the original certification (e.g., deviates from the registered design without notifying the change).
Otherwise, the AIR’s duties are purely bureaucratic:
- Transmission of original documents as well as application documents.
- Correspondence with the test laboratory
- Contact person for queries
In the case of PESO certification, the AIR must also have technical qualifications.