G. Kalyan Kumar
Continental Carbon, the world’s leading carbon black supplier will invest approximately $300 million in India. This will include upgrading of its existing plant and R&D center in the National Capital Region (NCR).
Explaining the rationale of the new investments, T.M. Chen, President of Continental Carbon India observed that the demand for carbon black is surging worldwide, driven by large end-user industries such as the automobile and tyre industry. In India, all the top tyre manufacturers are its customers.
Continental Carbon is the world’s leading carbon black supplier. Established in 1936 it works around the concept of the circular economy and is credited with many technological breakthroughs in carbon black production and applications.
The company recently opened its second manufacturing plant in Gujarat called as Continental Carbon Eco Technology (CCET) with 4 production lines. Opened in the second week of October, the green field plant has an annual production capacity of approximately 150,000 tons and the company invested $83 million in it.
Export focus
Chen was addressing a press conference in Hotel Le Meridien in New Delhi on 19th October. He noted that the current rate of production has been inadequate to meet the rising global demand. The CCI head said the decision to upgrade the infrastructure and capacity in India has been timely.
This will give CCI higher access to develop and expand in the Indian Ocean Region and leverage the cluster advantage of having tire customers and raw material supply chain in the region.
The president noted the two plants-- the National Capital Region unit plus the Gujarat facility will make CCI one of the top 3 carbon black suppliers in India.
The Ghaziabad plant in the NCR set up in the year 2000 has an annual capacity of approximately 85,000 tons. To meet the surging demand coming from new customers, the newly commissioned green field plant at Dahej in Gujarat is expected to help.
R&D ramp-up in India
The R&D facility in India is also being strengthened substantially. The R&D center in India is one of the three global R&D centers other than those in Taiwan and the USA.
The NCR center is being optimized to assist Continental Carbon’s future goals on product advancements and global layouts.
“We are hiring outstanding talents from India from fields such as electromechanical, chemical, material, and environmental engineering and increase our manufacturing and R&D output by another 45 percent,” Chen added.
India assumes an important position in the company’s investment map as the economy is considered stable. Also, the auto sector growth is very encouraging. The enhanced R&D will have focus on rubber, plastic, ink, coating, conductivity, and other applications.
Continental Carbon has been working closely with its partners in India since the start of the new millennium and wants to be a total solution provider to the rubber and plastic industry, in terms of critical inputs, advanced R&D, new technologies and professional services.
Globally Continental Carbon runs four operation centers, 3 R&D centers, and 9 production bases. The production plants are located in the USA, China, India, and Turkey, according to the presentation made by Tever Tu, one of the senior managers.
In addition to developing the excellent performance of carbon black products on tires, and rubber, the company also offers solutions for plastic products, ink coatings, and high-end 3D printing and electronic product applications.
