Housing plant attracts heir of Gerdau
Valor Econômico
Carlos Gerdau, first-born of Jorge Gerdau and one of the 16 heirs of the third generation of the traditional family name from Rio Grande do Sul, chose the popular real estate field to star as an entrepreneur six years ago. He progressed a little. Now, he took a more daring step: he entered into a partnership with a housing plant. His company, Domus Populi - "houses for the people", in Latin - acquired 50% of Brasitherm, which industrializes the production of houses by manufacturing concrete walls and taking them ready to the worksite.
Gerdau does not disclose the value of the deal. Brasitherm has a plant in Cotia and intends to open another three, all in São Paulo, before investing in other states. The next, which will have capacity to produce one thousand houses still this year, will be located in Atibaia. The investment in each manufacturing unit, with productive capacity for two thousand units a year, is estimated at nearly R$ 4 million (US$ 2.16 million). "Our goal is to have our own plants and partnerships with third parties", affirms Gerdau.
The partnerships have already started being prospected and they may be entered into with building companies interested in large projects - with the construction of a unit near or inside the worksite. "We are talking to many companies of the sector", says Gerdau. "I estimate a demand for 50 thousand units".
The purpose is to take advantage of the demand of the land developers for new technologies and industrialized models of construction, which allow large scale and high speed production. According to Michel Zeenni, of Brasitherm, with this system, a house can be completely ready within 18 days, and the putting up of the structure can be concluded in one day. Today, the companies of the sector work with the prefabricated system, in which the matrices (made of aluminum or PVC) are filled of concrete at the very worksite and get ready in less than 30 days.