Displaying items by tag: Italy

Italy: Alpacem subsidiary W&P Cementi has concluded a deal to buy Buzzi’s Fanna cement plant in Friuli-Venezia Giulia. The plant has a clinker capacity of 660,000t/yr. As a part of the deal, Buzzi will obtain a 25% stake in Alpacem’s Austrian subsidiary Alpacem Zement Austria. Alpacem said that the deal expands the companies’ existing strategic partnership into the Austrian market. The parties expect to conclude the deal, pending the approval of competition authorities, in 2024.

Alpacem chief executive officers Bernhard Auer and Lutz Weber said “We are pleased to be expanding the strategic partnership. There are many future challenges in the cement sector that we can solve better together than we can individually.”

Austria: Alpacem's Austrian subsidiary W&P Zement has announced its rebranding to Alpacem Zement Austria. Alpacem said that the rebrand in Austria will be the first step of a roll-out of the Alpacem brand across its local subsidiaries.

Alpacem has subsidiaries in Austria, Italy and Slovenia.

Italy: Buzzi's revenues rose by 14% year-on-year in the first half of 2023, to Euro2.15bn from Euro1.88bn in the first half of 2022. This was despite an 8.3% decline in its sales and volumes of cement and clinker, to 5.12Mt from 5.83Mt. The group recorded a rise in its earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of 58% to Euro575m from Euro365m. It noted an 'unfavourable economic situation,' with a slowdown in many of its markets.

Buzzi said "In the second quarter of 2023, the performance of the manufacturing segment was still weak, and contributed to limiting the growth prospects of international trade. In early 2023, consumer price inflation slowed down, thanks to the decrease in the energy component, although it remained at historically high levels. The decline in inflation was more evident in industrial goods, which incorporated the trend of energy prices." It added "Prospects continue to be negatively affected by persistent inflation and the consequent restrictive orientation of monetary policies in the major advanced economies, as well as by the uncertainty associated with the continuation of geopolitical tensions on a global scale, first of all the ongoing conlict in Ukraine."

Italy: Cementir Holding, a subsidiary of Caltagirone Group, recorded Euro841m in sales in the first half of 2023. This corresponds to year-on-year growth of 1.1% from Euro832m in the first half of 2022. The producer's earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) rose by 40% to Euro201m from Euro144m. Likewise, its net profit rose by 36% to Euro90.3m from Euro66.6m

Cementir Holding said that its cement sales volumes fell by 5.5% year-on-year during the half, to 5.1Mt. Volumes growth of 16% in China and Türkiye, and of 8% in Egypt, failed to offset a drop in Belgium, Denmark, Malaysia and the US. In Türkiye, the group increased its focus on the domestic market, and halved its export volumes. Exports also dropped in Malaysia, by 12%, as well as in Denmark.

Chair and chief executive officer Francesco Caltagirone said “The first half of 2023 closed with encouraging results, with significant increase in EBITDA, earnings before interest and taxation and net profit, thanks to careful management of profitability, which offset the general reduction in sales volumes."

UK: Private equity firm BGF has invested US$4.39m in carbon capture specialist Nuada. Nuada, formerly called MOF Technologies, is currently supplying its technology for a project at Buzzi’s Monselice cement plant in Italy. The system applies metal-organic framework (MOF) filters and vacuum swing absorption. Other partners on the project include Cementir Holding and Heidelberg Materials.

Nuada’s co-chief executive officer Conor Hamill said “There is no net zero without carbon capture. However, incumbent solutions are notoriously costly and energy intensive. Investment from BGF will further catalyse the scale-up and deployment of our technology, ensuring we are primed to efficiently decarbonise heavy industries.”

BGF’s investment is an extension to Nuada’s US$5.81m Series A funding round, which was co-led by the Clean Growth Fund and Barclays’ Sustainable Impact Capital portfolio.

Italy: Buzzi Unicem has announced a change of its name to Buzzi from 1 June 2023. The company has retained its blue U-shaped logo with the Buzzi name at its centre. Subsidiaries’ names will continue to appear in text alongside the logo. The group said that this enables each company to capitalise on its assets, while reaffirming the vision of a common identity.

Italy: Turboden has appointed Yoshinori Hyakutake as its chair. Hyakutake, Hiroshi Matsuda, the previous chair, and Yasuo Kamegawa have also been appointed as directors.

Hyakutake joined Nagasaki Shipyard and Machinery Works of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) in 1993. For the majority of his carrier with MHI he has worked in the thermal power engineering section. He later worked as a project manager on several export projects for thermal power plants. From 2017 to 2020, he worked for Mitsubishi-Hitachi Power System. Since 2021, he has been the Senior Vice President of New Business Development at MHI.

Turboden is a subsidiary of Japan-based MHI. The company manufactures and maintains organic Rankine cycle (ORC) systems, large heat pumps and gas expanders.

Italy: Italcementi, part of Heidelberg Materials, has filed a patent application for a titanium dioxide-based cementitious material. The Patent Office Journal has reported that the material consists of titanium dioxide (TiO2) imbued with carbon dopants. This is produced by irradiating the TiO₂ in the presence of an inert gas and an organic compound.

Türkiye: Italy-based CTP Team says it is currently installing a new waste heat recovery (WHR) system at Medcem Çimento’s Mersin plant. Its contribution to the construction of a new production line at the site includes installing an organic rankine cycle-based (ORC) 10.5Mwe WHR system and three new process fabric filters for the kiln and raw mill, coal mill and cement mills. The new line is expected to be commissioned in 2024.

Italy: Buzzi Unicem reported first-quarter sales of Euro956m in 2023, up by 20% year-on-year from Euro800m in the first quarter of 2022. The producer's cement volumes dropped by 8.8% to 5.8Mt from 6.36Mt. It attributed this to a general slowdown of the construction sector across its markets. Local low demand from the residential market and adverse weather compounded the regional sales contraction in Central Europe. On the other hand, the group recorded volumes growth in Mexico and Russia and stability in Brazil. Both Mexico and Brazil produced revenues growth, while Buzzi Unicem's revenues fell in Russia due to the effect of the appreciation of the ruble against the comparison period in 2022, when the start of the on-going Russian invasion of Ukraine devalued it.

Overall, the group expects to 'easily' match its 2022 full-year earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) in 2023. It said that that it could not currently delineate a 'clearly different picture,' but added "The stabilisation of energy prices, albeit at higher levels than in 2022, if confirmed, will allow us to have better visibility on the unfolding of the production costs from spring onwards."