Sentini Cermica eyes Rs 300cr turnover next fiscal

Company installing India's longest kiln at Chigurukota

Sentini Cermica Private Limited is targeting an annual turnover of Rs 300 crore next fiscal, after the doubling of its production capacity from March 2005.

The company, which commissioned its manufacturing unit in March this year, has manufactured tiles valued at Rs 75 crore in the first six months of the current fiscal.

Sentini Cermica is a 50:50 joint venture between Sentini Technologies, an information technology (IT) firm, and H&R Johnson (India) Limited, India's number one ceramic tiles company. The company supplies tiles to Johnson for marketing them under its popular brand names.

The company's Rs 105-crore manufacturing unit, set up in an 80-acre land at Chigurukota village near Vijayawada, was commissioned in March this year. The investment comprised an equity of Rs 35 crore and Rs 75 crore advances by banks.

Also, the longest kiln in the country's ceramic industry is being installed in a 500x29 mts shed in the factory at Chigurukota.

Sentini Cermica managing director T Seshagiri Rao, who is also chairman of Sentini Technologies, told Business Standard that the company would double its tiles production to 26,000 sq mts per day (targeting Rs 300 crore annual turnover) from March 2005 during the second phase, construction of which is under progress at a brisk pace. The company plans to increase production to 50,000 sq mts of tiles per day (17 million sq mts of tiles per annum) in due course.

Sentini Technologies, set up a decade ago, is providing best-of-breed enterprise network management (ENMS) solutions for enterprises in the United States, Europe and Asia Pacific.

It supplies software for security systems in banks, telephone companies and government offices and has built network operating centres (NOCs) for them in the above-mentioned countries. It has offices at Herndon in Virginia state and Atlanta in Georgia state in the US and in Hyderabad.

"H&R Johnson (India) has plants at Dewas (MP), Pen (Maharashtra), Kunigal (Karnataka) and Karaikal (Pondicherry), which together produce 15 million sq mts (Rs 400 crore) of its brands 'Marbonite' (polished vitrified) and 'Porceleno' (glazed porcelain) tiles. Its parent company H&R Johnson Tiles Limited (UK) is a prominent player in the world tiles industry," he said.

According to Rao, "Sacmi Imola of Italy, world leaders in tiles manufacturing, has supplied the technology and equipment to Sentini. Bhagavathi Designs is the firm's consulting engineer. Kirby Construction Systems has erected the prefabricated steel building and Gail, under an agreement, supplies natural gas to Sentini from the nearby Lingala-Kaikalur belt of K-G basin."

The company's f+uture plans include the expansion of the transport division at a cost of Rs 20 crore for bringing raw materials and for lifting finished goods.

A packaging unit will also come up by March 2005 at a cost of Rs 5 crore providing jobs to about 100 local women. Rao said that he was also contemplating setting up a steel and a sanitary ware unit.

He said that production, accounting and daily minute-wise activities of the company were done in SAP, which was implemented at a cost of Rs 2 crore, to maintain total transparency. The company's present staff strength of 600 would go up to 1,000 in the second phase.

Flooring moves

• The company has manufactured tiles valued at Rs 75 crore in the first six months of the current fiscal
• The company plans to double its tiles production to 26,000 sq mts per day from March 2005
• Its future plans include the expansion of the transport division at a cost of Rs 20 crore for bringing raw materials and for lifting finished goods