Displaying items by tag: Deal

UK: Aggregate Industries has signed a Euro3.3m deal with Siemens for technology and training services.

The agreement positions Siemens as Aggregate Industries’ preferred technology supplier across the company’s 330 UK sites. The partnership is intended to improve efficiency, make maintenance savings, and reduce the company’s carbon footprint. Siemens technology solutions include inverter drives, gearboxes, motors and control panels.

Siemens will also provide access to training and education facilities for all Aggregate Industries apprentices at Stephenson College in Coalville, Leicestershire. The focus on training will be supported regionally with Siemens supplying safety panels, which are to be utilised for staff training sessions across Aggregate Industries’ regional site network.

“This agreement positions Siemens as our preferred UK technology supplier, ensuring that we benefit from enhanced operational efficiencies over the long-term. This will deliver cost savings and improve system reliability. The technology solutions we will install will also help us reach our sustainability goals, as we seek to reduce the impact we have on the environment,” said Gerard Cantwell, Head of Procurement Europe at Aggregate Industries.

Germany/Pakistan: Germany’s Loesche says it has sold over 400 vertical roller mills for cement and ground granulated blast furnace slag, following a sale to Kohat Cement. Two LM 53.3+3 CS type mills has been sold to the Pakistani cement producer. The plant will produce 210t/hr of Ordinary Portland Cement at a fineness of 9% R 45 μm. No value for the deal has been disclosed.

The first Loesche LM type mill was put into operation at Fos sur Mer in France in 1994. Sales of the mill type for cement and slag markets have accelerated since 2006. The engineering company sold 50 LM mills in the 10 years to 2004. It then sold another 50 mills to 2006. However, from 2006 to 2014 it sold 200 mills. It then sold a further 100 mills after 2014.

Australia: Adelaide Brighton has signed a deal with BHP Billiton for the continuation of supply of cement and lime to BHP’s Olympic Dam mine in South Australia. The new contract maintains and extends the long-term relationship between subsidiaries of the companies. It is expected this relationship will continue for a number of years.

Australia: Adelaide Brighton has signed new gas and electricity contracts in South Australia. It has entered into an agreement with Beach Energy for the supply of gas to its South Australian operations. It has also entered into an agreement with Infigen Energy for the supply of its electricity requirements to the Birkenhead and Angaston cement plants and Klein Point Quarry on the Yorke Peninsula in South Australia. The new agreements are intended to manage the company’s energy requirements and costs following a series of blackouts in the region.

The cement producer said that its energy strategy includes: a portfolio approach to energy supply and procurement benefits; consumption management and operational efficiency; the aim of obtaining 30% of energy supply from alternative fuels in the medium term; use of alternative cementitious materials in place of more energy intensive products; cost recovery through vertical integration and long term customer relationships; and financial strategies.

Chile: The Briones family has decided to acquire another 13.1% stake in local cement producer Cementos Bío Bío from Brazil’s Votorantim for US$45.5m. The family thus intends to increase its shareholding to 39.5%. Votorantim would be left without an interest in the company if the deal goes ahead.

Thailand: Siam Cement Group (SCG) has signed a deal to import 155,000t of coal from the US for its cement plants in Thailand and elsewhere in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Kalin Sarasin, a senior SCG executive and chairman of the Thai Chamber of Commerce and Board of Trade, made the announcement following an official visit to the US by Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha, according to the Nation newspaper.

SCG will buy 100,000t of US coal in the first contract and a second contract will be for 55,000t to test the quality. Subsequently, the cement producer may buy more coal. At present, SCG imports around 6Mt/yr coal from Indonesia and Australia. The US coal will be used to substitute some of the Indonesian supply, which has been imported due to a higher demand for coal for power stations.

Nepal: The Investment Board of Nepal (IBN) has signed a project investment agreement worth US$359m with China’s Hongshi-Shivam Cement in connection with a cement plant being built at Nawalparasi. The agreement is the first of its kind signed by the IBN with a private sector company and it will last 15 years, according to the Kathmandu Post newspaper. The investment deal is the biggest made by a foreign company in the country’s manufacturing sector.

Hongshi-Shivam Cement is a joint venture between Nepal’s Shivam Holdings, which also produces Shivam brand of cement, and Hong Kong Red Lion Cement No 3, a subsidiary of China’s Hongshi Group. The Chinese company owns a 70% stake in the joint venture. Commercial production of cement is planned to start at the plant in 2018.

Nigeria: Over the weekend of 12-13 August 2017 Dangote Cement gave out prizes totalling US$1.3m to its distributors and customers in its on-going Dangote Retailers Bonanza – Season 2. 10 ‘Star Winner’ retailers from the company's West region claimed their prizes. Some went home with 1200 bags of cement and a 40ft container and others won 600 bags and a 20ft container.

The process of awarding the prizes involved moving cement directly to traders, which, according to Dangote Cement, had the desired effect of raising interest among other cement traders.

Funmi Sanni, the West Regional Sales Director, said the decision to take the products to the retailers in their respective place of trade was to prove that the bonanza was real. She explained that the management designed the bonanza to reward its loyal retailers and help them shore up their businesses, saying this is why it has also included containers in the winning package.

India: The Delhi High Court has rejected an appeal by Dalmia Bharat in a coal import deal with Glencore that went wrong. The cement producer will now be required to pay US$4.3m in damages and US$0.27m in interest, according to the DNA newspaper. Dalmia Cement, part of Dalmia Bharat Group, originally arranged a deal to import coal in multiple consignments. However it later refused to accept some of the shipments citing poor quality. Glencore then won damages at an arbitration tribunal that ruled that Dalmia had breached its contract.

Croatia: Zeljeznice, the Bosnia & Herzegovina railway federation, has signed a partnership with Croatia’s PPD Transport to transport gypsum to Nasicecement. The deal is to transport 20,000t of raw gypsum by the end of 2017 from supplier Rudnici Gipsa based in Donji Vakuf in Bosnia & Herzegovina, according to Klix media. Shipments were scheduled to start from the beginning of July 2017. No value for the contract has been disclosed.