Ispat eyes US car market for exports

Tuesday, 18 February 2003, 20:30 IST
Printer Print Email Email
KOLKATA: Ispat Industries Limited (IIL) is aggressively planning to market its newly-developed 1.2 mm and 1.6 mm hot rolled coil to the U.S. car makers after completing second phase of their HR capacity expansion programme by April-May this year. "We have already done a survey in the US and found that HR products of lower gauge had very good demand in that country and we are targeting a nominal share of that market," IIL director incharge, Vinod Garg, was quoted as saying. "As of now, we are not planning anything big for our cold rolled product lines," he said. "We expect that five-six years down the line, Indian automobile manufacturers will also go for HR products instead of CR galvanising as quality of HR sheets is fast improving and there will be considerable savings in cost as well," Garg said. Of the three lakh tonne planned for this year from Kalmeshwar, the company will sell CR to the tune of 15000-20000 tonne and the balance will be galvanised steel sheet and PVC coated steel, he said. Garg said considering the demand and price situation, they were targeting production of 1.26 million tonne of HR products this year as against 0.87 m tonne in 2001-02. "Fifty per cent of 1.26 m tonne would be exported and the balance would be sold in domestic market. Of the 50 per cent, share of galvanised sheet and colour coated steel would be about three lakh tonne, while other products would account for another about two lakh tonne of export," he said.
Source: IANS