Displaying items by tag: Joint Venture

Myanmar: Young Investment Group Industry Company Limited (YIGICL) has entered into a joint venture with China-based China Gezhouba Group Cement (CGGC) and China Gezhouba Group Overseas Investment (CGGOI) with the aim of establishing an integrated cement plant in Mandalay, Mandalay region. The joint venture, which is held 30:70 by YIGICIL and the Chinese partners respectively, will also set up a limestone mine.

India: The Bureau of Indian Standards has granted a licence to Counto Microfine Products (CMP), a joint venture of Ambuja Cements and medical company Alcon Group, for the production of micro-fine Ordinary Portland Cement (OPC) and ground granulated blast furnace slag (GGBFS) cement. The Times of India newspaper has reported that CMP operates a grinding plant in the state of Goa.

Bangladesh: Bangladesh Chemical Industries Corporation (BCIC) and Saudi Arabian-based Engineering Dimension International Investment (EDII) have formed a joint-venture called Saudi Bangla Integrated Cement in order to build a new integrated cement plant. The proposed unit will have a clinker production capacity of 12,000t/day, according to the Dhaka Tribune newspaper. It will be supplied with limestone from Meghalaya in India via a long conveyor belt. If realised the project is expected to create up to 700 direct and indirect jobs. Government-owned BCIC previously signed a partnership agreement with EDII in late 2018.

Taiwan: Asia Cement Corporation has announced its collaboration with Germany-based energy company Innogy on construction of a 448MW wind power plant off Taiwan’s north-west coast near Hsinchu City. Renewables Now has reported that Asia Cement Corporation will supply cement for the project, which will see power sold to the national grid.

Innology, which has participated in the construction of offshore wind plants with a total capacity of 2500MW in Europe, opened its first Taiwan office in 2018.

Thailand: SCG’s cement business has delivered sales and earnings growth in 2019 despite problems with the company’s chemicals business. It attributed its cement sales performance to growing distribution and retail businesses. Its cement business sales revenue grew by 1% year-on-year to US$5.93bn and its earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) grew by 3% to US$674m. SCG has also announced the creation of a retail joint-venture in Cambodia to sell building materials. Overall, the group’s sales declined by 8% to US$14bn in 2019.

Thailand: Siam Cement Group’s concrete and aggregates division SCC Concrete Products and Aggregates (CPAC) has entered into a joint venture agreement with Swedish digitisation specialist BIMobject for the formation of BIMobject Thailand Co., Ltd. (BIMobject TH) on a 51:49 basis in favour of CPAC. This will provide building information modelling (BIM) - a service platform for use in conceptual design, material selection, and construction simulation of customers’ projects. Siam Cement Group president and CEO Roongrote Rangsiyopash said, “This is in line with SCC’s strategic plan to extend its breadth of innovative construction solutions.” The joint venture will have US$170,000 registered capital.

UK: Breedon Southern, part of Breedon Group, plans to form a joint venture in London trading as Capital Concrete with Robert Brett and the Capital Concrete senior management. Three of Breedon’s existing ready-mixed concrete assets will be combined with those of Capital Concrete, Brett’s established ready-mixed concrete operation in London.

Capital Concrete currently operates seven ready-mixed concrete plants in Bow, Croydon, Romford, Rainham, Wembley, Silvertown and Staines. Breedon will contribute its plants in Cricklewood, Feltham and Enfield, together with Euro3.6m in cash, in return for a 43% interest in the joint venture. The remainder will be owned by Brett (43%) and management (14%).

“We have had a longstanding ambition to expand our footprint in the UK’s largest construction materials market. This joint venture enables us to secure immediate critical mass in Greater London, in collaboration with an experienced local partner, with the potential to develop a business of significant scale in the capital over the next few years,” said Pat Ward, group chief executive of Breedon.

Completion of the transaction is expected to take place on 1 December 2019.

Nepal: The parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has accused the Huaxin Cement Narayani plant being built at Benighat Rorang Rural Municipality in Dhading of ignoring the project’s Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) report. Members of the committee visited the site two months ago following complaints, according to the Republica newspaper.

It found that an 11km access road to the site had encroached upon a river. The company had used sand and stones from the river and used the materials to build the road. The road’s construction has also disrupted local agricultural irrigation canals. A flood at the site of the cement plant was reported in July 2019. An irregular deal to lease land to the joint venture was also reported.

India: UltraTech Cement has created a joint venture with Amplus Energy to expand its solar power generation capacity. The cement producer has acquired a 26% stake in the Amplus Sunshine, according to VCCircle Network. Amplus Sunshine will set up a 15MW captive solar plant at one of UltraTech’s Cement’s plants for an investment of around US$10m. The cement producer has a capacity of 50MW from its solar power plants but it intends to increase this. Amplus Energy installs rooftop solar power plants for the industrial and commercial sector.

Uzbekistan: Uzbek-Chinese joint venture Titan Cement (unrelated to the Greek group of the same name) has commissioned a 0.2Mt/yr plant in the Korauzyak District of the Republic of Karakalpakstan. The project had an investment of nearly US$40m, according to the Uzbekistan Daily newspaper. The funding was comprised of US$19m in direct investment from the joint venture, US$17m from loans and US$2m in foreign investment. This plant was originally reported as having started operation in mid-2016.