King Kong of microwaves a big griller

Richard Keam's company has high hopes that this $250,000 industrial microwave will zap it towards its goal to be the Fisher & Paykel of commercial cookware.

Industrial microwave equipment-maker Keam Holdem is due to ship the 8m-long, 12KW "microwave heating tunnel" to a large food-processing company in the US next week.

All going well, it will soon be following this up with a bigger version - 25 times its size in microwave power and about 16 times the price.

The Mt Eden-based company specialises in making industrial radio frequency and microwave technology for measuring and heating food.

Its Californian customer had scoured the world for industrial microwaves and chose Keam Holdem's for the precision it offered in temperature control.

The machine can heat 100kg to 200kg of food in three minutes.

Keam said microwave heating technology was starting to replace steam and gas systems in many commercial kitchens, due to greater efficiency and safety.

He established the company 10 years ago with fellow Crown Research Institute scientist John Holdem.

It is now one of the largest privately owned suppliers of this type of equipment in Australasia.

Keam Holdem recently partnered with US engineering company Margarine Solutions to distribute the VE2 - a machine that uses microwave technology to measure the moisture content in butter and cheese - giving it access to a dairy market double that of New Zealand's.