Asian Granito eyes European markets

Vitrified tiles manufacturer, Asian Granito (India) Limited, is exploring the European markets.

The Ahmedabad-based company also plans to ramp up its vitrified tiles production capacity and has already ventured into production of what it claims to be the country's biggest wall tiles range.

"We see a big opportunity in the European market as we have cost-effective product ranges. A large number of consumers in Europe have started preferring Indian products to the made-in-China tiles," said Hasmukh Patel, managing director, Asian Granito.

The company has started commercial production at its Rs 48-crore wall tiles unit at the Dalpur village in Himmatnagar in Gujarat. It has introduced wall tiles of 300 mm x 900 mm for the first time in India. Asian Granito had floated an initial public offer in July last year to fund its project.

Apart from implementing the wall tiles project, the company has expanded its production capacity of vitrified tiles from 4,000 sq mt a day to 9,300 sq mt a day. It plans to further expand this to 12,000 sq mt per day in the second phase.

Patel said though the vitrified tiles segment was growing 20 per cent globally, in India the demand was growing at 30 per cent. He said the company was also exploring possibilities of introducing premium wall tiles.

In the 2007 financial year, the company's R&D team introduced 20 new designs for vitrified tiles. The tiles market in the country is Rs 3,000-4,000 crore of which Asian Granito accounted for 6-8 per cent.

Kamlesh Patel, chairman, said the company had started trading imported marble and was also focusing on research and development.

The company's consolidated sales for the nine-month period ended December 2007 increased 20.23 per cent to Rs 165 crore as compared with Rs 137 crore during the corresponding quarter last year.