US-based modular carpet (carpet tiles) maker Interface Inc, which markets its products under the InterfaceFlor and Bentley Prince Street brands, is formalising plans to set up a manufacturing facility in India at an investment of $30 million (approximately Rs 147 crore) by 2011.
“We are at present scouting for locations that are close to sea ports,” InterfaceFlor president and chief executive officer (Europe, West Asia, India and Africa) Lindsey K Parnell told Business Standard on the sidelines of the Confederation of Indian Industry’s Green Building Congress 2009 in Hyderabad recently.
The over $1-billion company has seven manufacturing facilities across the US, UK, Asia and Australia, with the nearest plant to India being in Dubai, with a combined capacity of 50 million sft per year. The over three-and-a-half-decade-old company is set to commission its eighth plant in China later this month.
“We had formulated plans to set up a facility in India two years ago but shelved it due to the slowdown. India currently contributes Rs 70 crore to our global revenues and we expect to gradually move up again in the next two years,” Parnell said.
Stressing that one should use innovation so that ‘less is more’, he said Interface aimed to move from the traditional industrial approach of ‘take, make, waste’ to a more natural or cyclical system of material and resource flows.
Interface is committed to becoming a fully-sustainable company, leaving zero carbon footprint by 2020, Parnell said, adding “the company’s manufacturing units operate on 100 per cent green electricity, of which 89 is renewable. Recycled bio-based materials make up for 24 per cent of the raw materials used and these initiatives have produced results netting the company $405 million in cumulative avoided waste costs.”
