Orient Cement looks at acquisitions

Orient Cement, the C K Birla Group company with revenues of Rs 1,547 crore in FY15, said the demand cycle in Indian cement industry will pick up within a couple of quarters and the company is ready to take up the opportunity with inorganic growth.

In an interaction with Deccan Herald, Orient Cement managing director and chief executive officer Deepak Khetrapal said the country is witnessing policy tweaking on the infrastructure front. “We can see that the GDP growth will happen on massive investment in infrastructure and this will pick up demand for cement in the country,” he said.

The company registered a 224.53 per cent growth in the fourth quarter net profit in FY 2015 at Rs 85.48 crore. The quarterly revenue of the company, however, declined marginally at Rs 394 crore (Rs 401 crore).

The company’s full-year revenues grew eight per cent. Net profit for the full year was up 93 per cent at Rs 194 crore. The company has already set a target of achieving 15-million tonne per annum (MTPA) production by the end of 2020. “We are exploring all avenues to grow inorganically. Here we have already started investments in a greenfield project in Rajasthan. Also, we are looking at acquiring few production plants with production capacity of two MTPA to three MTPA in eastern India which will give value for our shareholders,” he said.

To another query, he said Orient Cement has invested Rs 1,500 crore at its soon-to-be-commissioned Kallaburgi plant to achieve an installed capacity of three MTPA. “We will make additional investments of Rs 500 crore by the end of this fiscal. We have got all clearance for the project and the state government nod for limestone mining is awaited within eight to 10 weeks,” he said.

Ready-to-mix segments

The company, which started its operations in 1982, has reached a capacity of seven million tonnes with cement plants at Devapur in Telangana, and a split-grinding unit at Jalgaon, Maharashtra.

Khetrapal said the company is looking at entering into the ready-to-mix segment of the business soon. “We are finding good business opportunities in this segment and are looking at options to invest in that segment also,” he said.

On captive power projects at Orient Cement’s unit sites, Khetrapal said the company will generate 101 mW by the end of this year.