Holcim to up capacity, invest Rs 3000 crore

Swiss major Holcim is scaling up its capacity by another 6 million tonne with an investment Rs 3,000 crore.

The global major's two arms "� Gujarat Ambuja Cements (GACL) and ACC "� will execute the expansion plans which will put the group comfortably ahead of rival Aditya Birla group.

In two separate announcements, ACC and Gujarat Ambuja said they were sprucing up capacities in Karnataka and Himachal Pradesh, respectively.

Gujarat Ambuja has approved a capital expenditure of Rs 1,519 crore for its new cement plant, along with two split grinding stations, at Darlaghat in Himachal Pradesh.

The plant will have an installed capacity of 3 million tonne. The project is expected to go on stream by March 2009.

ACC too is augmenting capacity in its new Wadi plant by 3 million tonne for which a capital investment of Rs 1,480 crore has been earmarked.

The Swiss cement major, Holcim recently has increased its stake in GACL by 3.7 per cent to 18.67 per cent. This will further go up 26 per cent by end of this year, post merger of GACL with Ambuja Cement Eastern (ACEL).

Holcim, along with GACL, holds 35 per cent stake in ACC. Holcim has a combined manufacturing capacity of 33.4 million tonne followed by 31 million tonne of Aditya Birla Group.

With 10 per cent annual growth in the country's cement consumption, which industry experts said would only go up, companies have announced fresh capacities of 75 million tonne by 2009-10. This will put the total capacity at 235 million tonne.