Displaying items by tag: Bolivia

Bolivia: Samuel Doria Medina, leader of the Unidad Nacional party, has sold his controlling shares of Soboce (Sociedad Boliviana de Cemento). Medina made the announcement after meeting with shareholders and officially listing the sale on the Bolivian stock exchange. Soboce was acquired by the Peru-based Holding Cementero, which has interests in the dairy, food distribution and service sectors. Prior to the full acquisition, Holding Cementero had an existing 49% stake in Soboce.

"I sold Soboce to completely devote myself to the people of Bolivia. In light of the October election results, which made my party the leading opposition force, I felt this was necessary," said Medina. He intends to donate some of the proceeds of the sale to charity.

Soboce was founded in 1925 in Viacha, La Paz. Medina took control of the firm in 1987, building the company from 200 employees to over 10,000.

Bolivia: FLSmidth has confirmed that it has signed a contract with Sociedad Boliviana de Cemento (SOBOCE) for supplies of equipment and machinery for a cement plant in Bolivia. Full information regarding the order will be released once the contract is considered binding, following exchange of down payment and guarantees. Local media has reported that the US$180m Yacuses, Puerto Suarez cement plant will have a cement production capacity of 0.8Mt/yr.

Bolivia: A Spanish-German consortium, formed by Imasa, Polysius and Valoriza, intends to build a US$244m cement plant in Bolivia. The consortium has received the order from Bolivia's state-run cement producer Empresa Publica Productiva Cementos de Bolivia (Ecebol).

The new factory will be located in the Oruro department near a limestone quarry that has reserves of 209Mt. This has the capability to supply raw material for 90 years. The plant will have an annual production capacity of 1.3Mt/yr.

Bolivia: A consortium, led by Sacyr Industrial, has won an order for the construction of a cement plant in Bolivia for US$244m.

The contract, which was signed with the Bolivian state-run cement producer Empresa Publica Productiva Cementos de Bolivia (ECEBOL), includes the design, supply of machinery, construction, installation and launch of the plant in the city of Oruro in the central west of the country. The plant is planned to have a clinker capacity of at least 3000t/day.

The contract is in line with Sacyr's strategy for global expansion. The company is already present in Australia, the UK and Peru, with various projects in the oil, gas, power infrastructure, energy and waste-treatment sectors.

Bolivia: Itacamba Cement intends to build a 0.85Mt/yr cement plant costing US$180m at Yacuses near Puerto Suarez, Santa Cruz. According to Bolivian local media, the project will start once President Evo Morales approves state-owned oil company Yacimientos Petrolíferos Fiscales Bolivianos to install a gas line. Itacamba intends the new cement plant to reduce its reliance on imported clinker from Brazil.

Currently based in the Santa Cruz region of Bolivia and established in 1991, Itacamba operates a cement grinding plant. It is majority owned by Votorantim (66%) and other entities including Bolivia's Tumpar Group. The new plant is expected to create 540 jobs when it is opened.

Brazil: Portuguese cement producer Cimpor, which has been controlled by the Brazilian diversified holding group Camargo Corrêa since June 2012, has started its first exports to northern Brazil.

The first shipment of 28,000t/yr of cement reached the port of Manaus, northwestern Brazil in July 2013, according to local press. Cimpor's main rivals in this region will be Brazilian sector players Votorantim Cimentos and Joao Santos.

Camargo Corrêa's subsidiary InterCement, which owns directly Cimpor, projects to import some 70,000t/yr of Portuguese cement to Brazil in 2013. Cimpor is also targeting exports to Bolivia amid the continuing severe economic downturn in Portugal.

Bolivia: Soboce's planned cement plant in Yacuses, Santa Cruz will require 10Mm³ of natural gas supplies, Soboce's main shareholder Samuel Doria Medina has said. According to the project's viability study, the plant will also need a pipeline to be built and a gas supply guarantee from state-run oil and gas firm Yacimientos Petroliferos Fiscales Bolivianos (YPFB).

Soboce estimates that the plant will cost US$160m to build. The project will be able to generate energy for its own consumption using natural gas. Soboce and YPFB have already built a 19.6km pipeline to supply gas to another plant in Viacha.

Bolivia: The Bolivian investment holding Cimsa, which is the majority shareholder of the country's largest cement firm, Soboce, has said that it will seek arbitration against Mexican cement firm Grupo Cementos Chihuahua for allegedly violating a partnership agreement.

GCC withdrew from Bolivia in a recent deal after completing the sale of its 47% share in Soboce, a private firm, to Peru's Consorcio Cementero del Sur, a subsidiary of Grupo Gloria.

Cimsa, owned by Bolivian opposition politician Samuel Doria, had a preferred interest in GCC's stake under Bolivian law, the company said in a statement.

"Cimsa will begin an arbitration process so that the failure to comply with the shareholder agreement and Cimsa's right of first refusal are adequately remediated, and the sale of the shares by GCC can be reversed," read a statement issued by Cimsa.

Earlier in 2011, GCC pulled out of a planned USD100m investment in a Bolivian housing project, citing a lack of legal security. In September 2010 Bolivia's government nationalized 33.4% of Soboce's shares in the state cement producer Fancesa. Soboce says it has yet to receive any compensation.

Bolivia/Peru: The Mexican cement maker Grupo Cementos de Chihuahua (GCC) has announced that it has finalised the sale of its 47% stake in Bolivian peer Sociedad Boliviana de Cementos (Soboce) to a unit of a major Peruvian conglomerate. GCC said that its stake in Bolivia's top cement maker would go to Consorcio Cementero del Sur, S.A., a subsidiary of the agroindustrial Grupo Gloria. It gave no details regarding the value of the deal.

"Proceeds from the transaction will be used primarily for debt reduction, in line with the company's goal of improving its financial profile and strengthening its core businesses in the US and Mexico," said GCC in a statement.

Previously, in April 2011, a judge in Bolivia ordered a freeze on assets held by Soboce, 53% of which is owned by a group controlled by Samuel Doria Medina, who is a political rival of the country's President Evo Morales.