25 March 1999: US-based Owens Corning Inc. is having a strong first quarter in 1999 with most businesses performing well, a top official said.
“We are having a very strong first quarter in insulation…
25 March 1999: US-based Owens Corning Inc. is having a strong first quarter in 1999 with most businesses performing well, a top official said. “We are having a very strong first quarter in insulation and roofing systems businesses, our composite system business worldwide is on plan but our exterior systems business is a little bit behind plan,” Glen Hiner, Owens Corning Chairman and CEO said. “I think we are going to have a very good first quarter.” The firm“s US$ 110 million India unit has started production of glass fibre reinforcements and expects to generate annual revenues of US$ 55-60 million from 1999, Hiner said. Owens Corning (India) Ltd., owned 50% by Owens Corning Inc., 26% by Indian automobile firm Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. and 24% by American International Group, Inc., has a 30,000 tonnes a year capacity plant at Taloja in western state of Maharashtra. Hiner said its four plants in China were focused on the building materials business. But the plants were smaller compared to the Taloja plant and the firm“s total investment in India is greater than investment in China, he said. “This is the biggest investment made by Owens Corning in any of its plants worldwide in the last couple of years. We will look at expansion in future along with the growth of the Indian and global markets for composites,” Hiner said. He said Owens Corning had not sought to grow its building materials business in India in a major way since use of its number one product, insulation, was not developed. “We are importing some (insulation) product into India so that we can use that as market development. As that builds, we would be very serious about investing here to produce insulation from our own technology,” Hiner said. Owens Corning was not contemplating any large takeovers in the next two years, he said. “We think we will be back in the acquisition market on a bigger scale in 2001.”