Finnish firm Metso to ramp up operations

Metso Minerals, the euro 4,000 million Finnish mineral mining and construction equipment company, is looking at options to expand its Indian operations.

"The Indian market has come off age and we are looking at investing "several million euros" in the next one year," said Bertel Langenskiold, president and chief executive officer, Metso Minerals.

The company heads who are visiting India will look at adding more capacity to the foundry, expand factory operations and add manpower in the next two-three years.

"At present the capacity of the Ahmedabad foundry is 800 million tonne and we will look at adding more," Langenskiold said.

"The capacity expansion will be in line with our plans to increase exports from India. The market here is cost effective and is strategically positioned for the Asian market which will help us ramp up our exporting activities," he said.

Metso Minerals, which started its operation in India in 2005 through a 100 per cent subsidiary - Metso Minerals India, has a foundry in Ahmedabad and a factory in Delhi-Jaipur highway.

A company official said the Finnish company could look at a greenfield expansion. However, Langenskiold refused to comment on any such development.

"We were having difficulties in operations in 2003 with the construction activities not picking up as per our expectations but we have recovered last year. The parent company is planning to increase the Indian operation," said Sudhir Srivastava, managing director, Metso Minerals India.

The Indian arm contributes less than one per cent of the global revenues of Metso Minerals, while the Asia-Pacific operations contribute around 15 per cent.

Though the main activities of the company is focussed on the US, Langenskiold said there could be a gradual shift towards the Asian markets.

Metso Minerals has a significant presence in the Chinese market but is facing problems due to greater percentage of manual labour.

"We are facing higher percentage of manual labour in China and expect to face a similar situation in India. We will have to change the strategies to adopt to the Asian markets," Langenskiold said.