Displaying items by tag: Birla

India: Acting on a tip-off that was received by the senior superintendent of police, Manu Maharaj, local police raided a store house in Chamanchak state and seized 5000 sacks of cement that had been packed in the name of leading names like Lafarge and Birla. The raid took place on 19 January 2014.

Four persons involved in the trade managed to flee. A case has been registered with the local police station. Police are currently looking for the absconders and gathering information regarding similar cement store houses.

India: Birla Corporation is planning invest around US$154m to set up new units in four states, according to local media. The company will set up three grinding cum blending units in Madhya Pradesh, one grinding unit in Bihar, one blending unit in Uttar Pradesh and another in Jharkhand, which will have a combined capacity of 4.5Mt/yr. Birla Corporation has eight manufacturing facilities located in Pune, Rajasthan, West Bengal, Gurgoan, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.

India: Birla Corporation has announced that it will increase cement production capacity by 4.5Mt/yr with an investment of around US$416m over a period of three years. Of the proposed 4.5Mt/yr, the company plans to set up two 1.5Mt/yr facilities at Chanderia, Rajasthan and a 1.5Mt/yr plant at Satna, Madhya Pradesh.

The total cement production capacity of the company at present is 9.3Mt/yr. The proposed expansion therefore represents around half of its current installed capacity.

India: Birla Corporation has promoted BR Nahar to the managing director of the company. The decision was made at the board of directors meeting held on 28 July 2012. Nahar, a Fellow Member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, holds more than 33 years professional experience. He became Birla's executive director and chief executive officer in 2006. He has served in diverse fields at senior positions in various large corporate houses.

India: Birla Corporation has earned a profit after tax of US$15.3m in the first quarter of the current financial year (ending 30 June 2012) against US$20.2m in the same quarter of the previous year. This represents a more than 24% drop year-on-year. Birla's net sales from operations for the quarter were US$118.5m. 

Commenting on the results, Harsh V Lodha, chairman of the company, said that the profitability of the company continued to be affected due to the closure of limestone mining operations at its Chanderia units on account of an order from the high court of Jodhpur. It was also observed that higher coal and freight prices had caused reduced margins.

India: India's biggest cement producer, Jaiprakash Associates, says that it is planning to sell its cement units in Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh as a part of its divestment plan. In a move that is very similar to those of debt-ridden European and North American cement producers, local media has reported that Jaiprakash has been in talks with at least two different investors, including domestic group Aditya Birla and Lafarge from France. It is looking to sell its 'Jaypee Cement' unit plants, which are already run as a separate company.

Birla and Lafarge have finished their first round of talks with Jaypee. Final bids will be completed in two months. Jaypee wants to exit the cement production business in order to focus on its core activities.

Earlier, it was also reported that Switzerland's multinational Holcim Ltd. was prepared to spend up to US$1.6bn on the three plants, which have a joint capacity of 9.8Mt/yr.

Ethiopia: In what would be its maiden overseas venture, India's Birla Corp has announced plans to set up a cement plant in Ethiopia. The MP Birla group company has recently formed a wholly-owned subsidiary, Birla CorpCement Manufacturing plc, in Ethiopia to establish a plant.

"We plan to go there for exploration of limestone to set up a cement plant," said a Birla Corp official. "We would also explore opportunities to set up power plants there."

While Ethiopia is economically poor it is endowed with significant limestone deposits. Cement companies have started eyeing projects in the country after the government started facilitating the import of coal. The country currently imports cement because local demand far outstrips supply and acute power shortages keep new investments away.

This is not the first time that Birla Corp has tried to enter the Ethiopian cement market. In 2010 it made a contract bid for the construction of a cement plant at Habesha but lost out to Chinese competitors. Chinese mining companies have taken up extensive limestone mining contracts in Ethiopia in recent years, firming up long-term off-take contracts.