Displaying items by tag: India

Small print can cause large consequences. Billion US Dollar consequences. Take the 2015 amendment to India’s Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) (MMDR) Act from 1957. Ambiguous wording in the legislation may have held up two prominent cement industry acquisitions in 2015. It also hangs over the recently announced purchase by UltraTech Cement of Jaiprakash Associates’ cement plants.

The MMDR was amended in January 2015. As the Times of India explained in mid-2015, a clause in the amendment said, “The transfer of mineral concessions shall be allowed only for concessions which are granted through auction.” However, it was unclear whether this meant historically allocated mines given via nominations or only newly allocated ones. Given the reliance of clinker plants on reliable mineral reserves this caused havoc. Cue confusion and large legal budgets.

LafargeHolcim’s divestment of two cement plants to Birla Corporation was one casualty. As a condition of the merger between Lafarge and Holcim the Competition Commission of India (CCI) required that the Jojobera and Sonadih cement plants in Eastern India be sold in 2015. Together the plants have a combined cement production capacity of 5.1Mt/yr. However the ambiguity over the 2015 MMDR Act clause on transfer of mining rights held the deal up. By February 2016 Birla Corporation had endured enough. It publicly complained about Lafarge India’s ‘inability’ to complete the deal and threatened legal action. LafargeHolcim retorted by asking the CCI if it could sell all of Lafarge India instead. It received the revised clearance and a new buyer is yet to be announced.

Another victim was UltraTech Cement in a previous attempt to buy Jaiprakash Associates’ cement assets. That time it was down to buy two integrated cement plants in Madhya Pradesh with a combined clinker production capacity of 5.2Mt/yr with associated mineral rights. The deal was agreed in December 2014 and then reported delayed in mid-2015. Finally, on 28 February 2016 the Bombay High Court rejected the deal, citing the MMDR Act as the prime cause.

Luckily for UltraTech Cement the story has a happy ending (so far) as it then announced that it was purchasing the majority of Jaiprakash Associates’ 22.4Mt/yr cement portfolio instead for US$2.4bn. It is hoped that the deal will be finalised by June 2017 but this partly depends on the MMDR Act being amended. Although UltraTech Cement have said they are looking at alternative routes to the deal in case the act isn’t amended.

Poor legal wording kiboshed at least two cement industry deals for over 10Mt/yr production capacity. Roughly, at the price UltraTech Cement is paying for its latest deal, that’s over US$1bn worth of Indian cement assets. Given the hard time the Indian cement industry had in 2015 the question should be asked regarding how much damage the MMDR Act amendment has done. One option for the beleaguered industry is to consolidate and cut its costs. This was massively delayed in 2015.

The proposed 2016 amendment to the MMDR Act reads as follows:

“Provided that where a mining lease has been granted otherwise than through auction and where mineral from such mining lease is being used for captive purpose, such mining lease will be permitted to be transferred subject to compliance with the terms and conditions as prescribed by the Central Government in this behalf.”

Let’s hope it does the trick this time.

India: Shailendra Chouksey, a director of JK Lakshmi Cement, has been appointed as the new president of the Cement Manufacturers' Association (CMA) for a two year term. He replaces OP Puranmalka, the managing director of Ultratech Cement. Previously Chouksey was the vice-president of the association.

"As the newly elected president of the CMA, my priority is to device methods to work with different stakeholders, including the government of India to spur the cement demand," said Chouksey.

Chouksey holds a PhD in managerial economics, an MBA in marketing from the Faculty of Management Studies, Delhi and a post-graduate degree in physics. He has worked in the cement industry for nearly 40 years.

India: Martin Kriegner will be appointed Head of India for LafargeHolcim, effective on 1 March 2016. He will report to Eric Olsen, Group CEO and succeed Bernard Terver who has decided to retire. Kriegner is currently the Area Manager Central Europe,

Kriegner, an Austrian national, joined LafargeHolcim in 1990 and has previously held several senior leadership positions in the Group, including CFO and CEO of the Group operations in Austria as well as Head of Lafarge India and Regional President Cement for Asia. He graduated from Vienna University with a Doctorate in Law and obtained an MBA at the University of Economics in Vienna.

Bernard Terver joined the Group in 1994 and became member of the Senior Management in 2012. He was responsible for Ambuja Cements and ACC in India since 2014 and was appointed Head of India at LafargeHolcim following the merger.

India: Kakatiya Cement Sugar & Industries has appointed Shri P Veeraiah as its chairman and managing director effective from 3 February 2016. He was previously the joint managing director of the company. The appointment has been made following the death of Shri P Venkateswarlu. It is subject to the approval of shareholders, which is expected to be obtained at the next annual general meeting.

Last week we promised reasons to be cheerful for the cement industry. We only have one to offer this week but it's a good one. At present three Indian cement companies are on sale: Lafarge India, Reliance Cements and Jaiprakash Associates. If these sales complete then it represents an opportunity for the Indian cement industry to reorganise itself and stride forward when growth recovers.

Lafarge India upped its sales proposal to the Competition Commission of India (CCI) on 6 January 2016 to sell its entire 11Mt/yr portfolio. Originally as part of the LafargeHolcim merger agreements the CCI asked Lafarge to sell 5.2Mt/yr of production capacity in Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand in eastern India. However the deal was reliant on the original buyer, Birla Corporation, securing limestone mining rights. Birla failed to do so. Now Lafarge India has decided to sell everything instead. Naturally, following its Euro8bn spending spree in 2015 CRH has been linked to the sale by Indian media.

Then following press speculation Reliance Infrastructure confirmed to the Bombay Stock Exchange on 11 January 2016 that it was at an 'advanced stage of discussions with potential buyers for divesting the cement business of the company.' Reliance's cement arm, Reliance Cement, holds three cement plants in Maihar in Madhya Pradesh, Kundanganj in Uttar Pradesh and Butibori in Maharashtra with a total production capacity of 5.8Mt/yr. In addition to this, the company is also developing a 5Mt/yr cement plant at Wani in Maharashtra. The Reliance sale has been reported upon since early 2015. The difference this time is that Reliance responded to local press reports that it was about to sell to Birla Corporation or a couple of other private equity firms.

Finally, the third sale concerns Jaiprakash Associates' on-going attempts to sell its remaining cement assets to service its debts. Jaiprakash Associates cement subsidiary, Jaypee Cement, holds eight plants in India with a cement production capacity of 11Mt/yr. In addition it holds six cement grinding plants with a capacity of 10.7Mt/yr. Despite reported attempts to sell the entire division in one Jaypee has actually ended up selling its cement assets in a piecemeal fashion one or two at a time. The most recent sale being announced this week is to sell its Bhilai Jaypee Cement to Shree Cement. This follows other sales to HeidelbergCement and UltraTech in 2015.

None of these sales are new exactly but the combined production capacity of these plants comes to just under 28Mt/yr. This represents 9% of India's total national cement production capacity of 310Mt/yr. Any player somehow able to weasel their way into striking a deal for all of these plants would immediately become one of the country's biggest producers.

It would definitely be a case of buyer beware though. Credit agency ICRA recently reported that it expects that cement demand growth will be a 'modest' 4% in the 2015 - 2016 financial year before picking up in the following year. This follows poor growth in cement demand in the first half of 2015 and even declines in March and April 2015. ICRA also expected the country capacity utilisation to drop to 70% in the 2016 financial year, down from 77% in the 2012 financial year. That 7% drop in the utilisation is awfully close to the 9% of Indian national production capacity that the cement assets currently on sale from Lafarge India, Reliance Cement and Jaypee Cement. Unsurprisingly, the buyers of Indian cement assets have been picking and choosing their plants one-by-one so far.

India: Kakatiya Cement Sugar & Industries' Chairman and Managing Director, Shri. P Venkateswarlu, passed away on 11 January 2016.

India: UltraTech Cement has appointed K K Maheshwari as Managing Director and Additional Director for a period of four years with effect from 1 April 2016. Maheshwari is a chartered accountant with over 38 years of experience.

The post was previously held by O P Puranmalka, who will cease to be the company's Managing Director on 31 March 2016, but will continue as a Non-executive Director from 1 April 2016.

India: Prism Cement Limited has appointed Joydeep Mukherjee as its Chief Executive Officer - HRJ (designate) and Key Managerial Personnel with effect from 16 December 2015. HRJ or H R Jhonson is a division of Prism Cement.

Here are the major stories from the cement industry in 2015 as the year draws to a close. Remember this is just one view of the year's events. If you think we've missed anything important let us know via LinkedIn, Twitter or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Will the year of the mega-mergers pay off?
2015 showed a global cement industry that was consolidating. Amongst the multinational producers Lafarge and Holcim finished their merger and HeidelbergCement announced that it was buying Italcementi. Yet alongside this international trend the large Chinese cement producers, who represent over a quarter of the world's production capacity, have continued their own-government-favoured consolidation. The on-going boardroom scuffles at Shanshui have been a lively example of this.

Where this will leave the cement industry as a whole in 2016 is uncertain but mergers and consolidation are no 'magic bullet' for difficult market conditions. After the fanfare subsided from the launch of LafargeHolcim the first quarterly report emerged in late November 2015 reporting falling net sales, net volumes and profit markers.

BRICing it – growth stalls in Brazil, Russia, India and China
The economies of the BRIC nations – Brazil, Russia, India and China – have all suffered in 2015. Brazil and Russia are enduring recessions. Growth in China and India is slowing down. All of this has a knock on in their respective construction sectors.

Over in China, we report today that production capacity utilisation is estimated to be 65% and that cement companies lost US$2.63bn in the first nine months of 2015. The same source says that at least 500Mt/yr of production capacity needs to be eliminated. That represents nearly a third of Chinese total production capacity or about an eighth of global cement production capacity.

Multinationals African plans accelerate
One consequence of all these international mergers is the transformation of the situation in Africa. Suddenly LafargeHolcim has become the biggest cement producer on the continent, followed by HeidelbergCement, Dangote and PPC. Africa becomes the big hope for the multinationals as established markets continues to flounder and growth in Asian and South American markets slackens. Perversely though, should African development growth slow it may cast a poor light on the mega-mergers of 2015 in the coming years.

Dangote Cement is growing fast and it may overtake HeidlebergCement soon as the second largest cement producer in Africa. Yet it may not be plain sailing for the Nigerian company. As we report today, sources in Gambia say that Dangote's plans to open a cement plant are on hold in part to protect its domestic suppliers.

The Gambian government has denied a licence to Dangote to open a cement plant. Dangote has built its empire in recent years by forcing out cement importers from Nigeria. As it expands in other countries in Africa it may now be facing a backlash to playing the nationalist card at home as other countries too desire 'self-sufficiency' in cement production.

Iran shakes off the sanctions
In July 2015 Iran and the P5+1 countries agreed to lift trade sanctions from Iran. The implications for the local cement industry are immense given that the country was the joint-fourth largest producer in 2014, based on United States Geological Survey data. Remove the sanctions and, in theory, the local economy should boom leading to plenty of construction activity. Notably, at the launch of LafargeHolcim the new CEO Eric Olsen was asked for the new group's position on Iran. It didn't have one but this will change.

China expands along the Silk Road
China's cement industry may be suffering at home but it has been steadily expanding in Central Asia. Notably Huaxin Cement has plants in Kazakhstan and Tajikistan and it has new projects in the pipeline. Business may be down at home but steady advancement abroad may offer the Chinese cement industry the lifeline it needs.

Cop out at COP21?
And finally... The 2015 Paris Climate Conference announced a diplomatic coup d'etat in December 2015. However, it apparently forgot to include any binding targets. The Cement Sustainability Initiative (CSI) pre-empted the decision by announced its aim to reduce CO₂ emissions by clinker producers by 20 - 25% by 2030... Provided the entire cement industry follows its lead. Cement plants burning vast swathes of dirty fossil fuels may not have to worry quite yet.

For more a more detailed look at trends in the cement industry check out the Global Cement Top 100 Report in the December 2015 issue of Global Cement Magazine.

Global Cement Weekly will return on 6 January 2016. Enjoy the holidays if you have them.

The past week has seen several quarterly financial results from producers in the world's second-largest cement industry: India. So far, they do not make for a great read from an economic perspective, although some players, including Birla Group and Sanghi Cement are yet to show their hands.

So let's kick off. For the quarter that ended on 30 September 2015, LafargeHolcim subsidiary Ambuja Cements saw its net profit slide by 36% year-on-year to US$23.6m compared to the same period of 2014. Its income fell by 4% to US$324m as it battled a one-off charge. ACC, LafargeHolcim's other Indian subsidiary, saw a profit of US$17.5m for the quarter, a year-on-year fall of 40% compared to 2014. Not great for the global number one player.

Other players to announce so far have included JK Cements, which reported a 58% fall in consolidated net profit to US$2.1m. Meanwhile, Century Textiles, which owns Century Cement, fared even worse. It actually posted a loss compared to a marginal profit in 2014, despite an increase in total income.

It has not been all doom and gloom however. UltraTech Cement, while it reported a drop in profit, was not as badly affected as the firms listed above. It recorded a 3.9% fall to a net profit of US$59.7m for the quarter, down from US$62.3m in the same period of 2014. This was reported as being better than expected according to a senior research analyst at Angel Broking, perhaps hinting at shaky ground under even these results.

So far, the exception to the lower profits and losses has been India Cements Ltd (ICL), which posted an almost five-fold growth in its net profit. It profit grew from US$1.14m to US$6.26m, which it said stemmed mainly from improved operating parameters and substantial reductions in its variable costs. Its operating profit grew to US$35.4m from US$27.9m. It expects performance to improve as it increases its capacity utilisation rate up, currently languishing at just 60%.

Does the company provide a model for other producers to follow? Perhaps. The company's managing director and vice-chairman of ICL, N Srinivasan, said that the company was poised for improved conditions in its markets. In the company's results he said, "Going forward, we see better times ahead. We had a tough time for two years and have achieved a turnaround by cutting costs and maintaining a healthy cement price." The fact that ICL has managed to 'maintain a healthy cement price' in times of low requires scrutiny in a separate column.

However, a possible take-away from the results released so far is that the larger producers seem to have greater immunity to the problems surrounding over-supply in India. Economies-of-scale and the ability to spread risk around different Indian markets tends to favour larger players like UltraTech. Conversely, a smaller player that finds itself 'stuck' in one of the weaker regional markets, must just sit tight and weather the storm. Either that or it can make itself into a strategic acquisition target for one of the larger groups.

We are still awaiting results from other players in the Indian market, but with low demand, it would be foolish to expect them to be significantly different from the above. Given this, two key factors will help determine whether the decline in profits continues or not. Firstly, India's Modi government is promising large-scale infrastructure projects, which would help boost demand for cement. The industry has heard such promises in the past, however, and may chose to be skeptical. Secondly, it is important to remember that lower profits are being seen at the moment, even despite lower coal costs. Any upward change in these costs and the pace may become too fast for some of the country's smaller producers.