Tata BlueScope Steel enters retail segment

Kolkata, Sept 19 (UNI) Tata Bluescope Steel, a 50:50 joint venture (JV) between Tata Steel and BlueScope Steel, today declared its foray into the country's retail segment with DURASHINE range of colour coated steel building products.

Tata BlueScope Steel Ltd Vice-President (Building Products&Distribution) Hakimuddin Ali told newspersons here today that the the DURASHINE range of products included roofing, walling, purlin and readymade guard huts.

He said the products would be manufactured from the firm's three units at Chennai, Pune and Bhiwandi, adding the facilities produced a range of roll-formed products and pre-engineered buildings(PEB).

''The colour coated steel manufacturing facility, with a production capacity of 2,50,000 tonnes, is under construction at Jamshedpur and will be operational in the last quarter of 2009,'' Mr Ali informed.

The firm's Jamshedpur expansion entailed a total investment of Rs 900 crore, which was funded through internal accruals, according to him.

The market share of the company in terms of building solutions and PEBs stood at 25-30 per cent in the country, the V P informed.

Tata BlueScope Steel, operating in the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation(SAARC) region, has two business divisions, namely, coated steel and buildings. The coated steel division looks after zinc-aluminium alloy coated steel under the brand name ZINCALUME and COLORBOND steel.

The compnay had notched up a turnover of Rs 280 crore in the previous fiscal and such figure was expected to scale Rs 500 crore at the current fiscal-end, Mr Ali further informed.

While 1,85,000 tonnes of colour coated material in the Indian market was manufactured in the country, another 85,000 tonnes was imported from overseas, Tata Steel Ltd Chief of Marketing (distribution and marketing products) Atrayee Sarkar Sanyal observed.

Ms Sanyal added that the construction industry was recording an annual growth of 10-12 per cent.

UNI SB KK DB1843