Greece: Titan Group says that cost savings, lower prices for solid fuels and price ‘resilience’ all helped to grow its earnings in the first half of 2020. Its earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBTIDA) rose by 12% year-on-year to Euro137m from Euro122m in the same period in 2019. Its revenue remained stable at Euro786m in the first half of 2020. Cement sales volumes fell by 2% to 7.9Mt but ready-mix concrete increased by 1.3% to 2.64Mm³ and aggregates increased by 2.6% to 9.2Mt. Although coronavirus-related lockdowns were mostly blamed for falling cement sales volumes they were also affected lower exports from Greece and the lack of fly ash supply in the US. Its US and Eastern Mediterranean regions contributed the most to its performance, with strong starts to the year in Egypt and Turkey before as the pandemic mounted.

India: Calderys has completed its acquisition of Hysil’s calcium silicate insulation division. The deal was signed in January 2020 but delayed to July 2020 due to coronavirus-related lockdowns. Calcium silicate boards are used for thermal insulation in industries such as cement, metallurgy, oil refinery, petro-chemical and power plants. Calderys says it now the largest manufacturing capacity of calcium silicate boards in India and South East Asia. The purchase will enable it to expand its product portfolio and offer calcium silicate insulation products along with refractories solutions.

UK/Ireland: Breedon Group’s sales fell by a quarter in the first half of 2020 due to coronavirus-related lockdown measures. Its revenue fell by 25% to Euro371m in the first half of 2020 from Euro495m in the same period in 2019. Its underlying earnings before interest and taxation (EBIT) dropped to Euro0.7m from Euro54.8m. Cement sales volumes deceased by 20% to 0.8Mt, aggregates by 20% to 8Mt and ready-mixed concrete (RMX) by 33% to 1Mm³. Its net debt fell by 26% to Euro281m.

“Following the encouraging performance of our businesses in the first 12 weeks of the year, the move into lockdown and immediate fall in demand in the latter part of March led us into a swift and managed shutdown of the majority of our operations, leaving open only those which were servicing critical needs,” said group chief executive officer (CEO) Pat Ward. He added, “The recovery in our markets now appears to be well underway, and we have seen continued improvement into July. The great majority of our sites are now open, including both our cement plants. While near-term uncertainty remains, there is significant pent-up demand to be satisfied in both housing and infrastructure.”

India: Aditya Birla subsidiary UltraTech Cement has recorded a net profit of US$122m in the three months to 30 June 2020, the first quarter of the 2021 fiscal year – down by 28% year-on-year from US$169m in the corresponding period of the 2020 fiscal year. Sales were US$975m, down by 33% from US$1.45bn.

The company said, “UltraTech has emerged stronger and well-prepared in the wake of the on-going Covid-19 pandemic. The total lockdown period from late-March 2020 to 1 May 2020 has been a huge challenge for all manufacturing industries. UltraTech has managed the crisis with a sharp focus on operational efficiencies. In the available 68 operating days during the quarter, the company kept a tight control on costs and cash flow and achieved an effective capacity utilisation of 60% across its network of 54 plants around the country.”

UltraTech said that it had already noted “better-than-expected pick-up in cement consumption in rural markets,” which it attributed to “measured steps towards economic recovery” by national and state governments.