Romi chooses Santa Bárbara DOeste to set up US$ 139.4 mi plant
Valor Econômico - 05/15/2008
With the purpose of benefiting from the good moment of the car sector in the country, Indústrias Romi - a machinery manufacturer - confirmed Santa Bárbara D'Oeste, in the countryside of the state of São Paulo, as the municipality to receive the new project for the expansion of its productive capacity of the areas of machining and casting. The selection of the town, which competed with others from the states of Minas Gerais and Espirito Santo, takes place five months after the company announced an investment plan of R$ 230 million (US$ 139.4 million) to double the production of metal castings and add 40 thousand tons to the production of machined parts. Expected to come into operation in the first quarter of next year, the new Romi unit will strengthen the presence of the company in the car market, currently at approximately 3%, the same as Tecumseh, its main rival. From January to March this year, the sales of the company for the sector represented 19.3% of its net earning, nearly R$ 29.4 million (US$ 17.8 million). Currently, the metal castings production capacity of Romi is 40 thousand tons a year and the capacity to produce machined parts, 25 thousand tons. The investment will be split, R$ 110 million (US$ 66.7 million) for casting and R$ 120 million (US$ 72.7 million) for machined parts. Livaldo Aguiar dos Santos, CEO of the company, says the production increase will be made progressively. "In the first year, an increase of 10 thousand tons and the maximum capacity will be reached by 2011", he says. According to him, the essential equipment such as traveling cranes, oven and energy substation have already been acquired. The new casting and machining unit is not part of the investments planned after the migration of Romi to the New Market of the Stock Exchange of São Paulo (Bovespa), in April of last year. At the time, the first issuance of shares yielded the company R$ 230 million (US$ 119.2 million). Santos reiterates that these resources will be used in acquisitions. "We have some projects in advanced negotiation", he reveals. The focus of Romi's acquisitions are industries that operate with metal casting and machined parts, with sales between R$ 70 million (US$ 42.9 million) and R$ 300 million (US$ 184.1 million). In January, the company acquired J.A.C. Indústria Metalúrgica, specialized in plastic blowers, by R$ 5.5 million (US$ 3.2 million).