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Ceylon
Glass enters UK market
Impending
5th production line would complete the expansion to double
output to 250 tons per day
Ceylon
Glass Company, (CGC) has recently entered the highly competitive
UK market, whilst the implementation of the fifth production
line would complete expansion of doubling its output to 250
tons per day.
The company currently operates four manufacturing lines, producing
an estimated 200 tons a day, while the fifth line is expected
to commence operations soon.
“With the commencement of the fifth manufacturing line
and installation of the Boosting System our production capacity
at the Horana Plant will then go up to 250 tons per day,”
CEO and Executive Director Sanjay Tiwari said.
He added that the Company was already producing more than
150 varieties of bottles, catering to over 200 customers for
a range of industries including the pharmaceutical, soft and
hard liquor, carbonated drinks, food and beverages, cosmetics,
perfume and agro chemical sectors. He further said that they
would give priority to provide 100% of the local glass requirement.
With the commissioning of the new Plant, the company’s
current production capacity for manufacturing coloured bottles
of different shapes would be more than doubled. Tiwari added
that this enabled CGC to export larger volumes of different
coloured and shaped wine bottles to all major wine producing
countries.
According to Sanjay Tiwari, the domestic requirement for glass
is increasing at a rate of 8% - 10% annually and the global
demand in also increasing stably. A significant factor was
the growing worldwide demand for specialty glass containers
that have presented opportunities for the company to enter
the niche market for coloured glass containers. He stated
“We are already the sole supplier of some special colour
bottles for a major brand of the world’s second largest
liquor producing company.”
The CEO said, entering the UK glass market is a huge challenge
faced by any company and proudly added that his company had
succeeded in securing orders from UK.
Currently, wine bottles made by Ceylon Glass are exported
to the growing Indian market, where there is now considerable
demand on the part of consumers for wine. Some coloured bottles
have also been exported to Australia, the Philippines, the
Maldives and Mauritius.
CGC, a BOI venture has introduced new technology and is currently
one of initial pioneers in South Asia that is able to manufacture
a wide range of bottles made of coloured glass.
CGC signed an agreement with the BOI to invest over US $ 20
million in the relocation of a state of the art production
facility at Horana, in the first phase. The production facility
was located at Horana in line with the BOI policy called the
‘300 Enterprise Programme’ that has sought to attract
investment to areas outside Colombo and Gampaha, the two districts
that have always got the lion’s share in terms of investment
and the benefits of investment. The old glass manufacturing
plant was initially located at Ratmalana, where the company
now operates the office and the warehouse, but the bulk of
its activities and manufacturing is done in Horana. This need
to spread the benefits of investment across the country for
the greater population of the island has been identified as
a strategic objective of the BOI by Dr Sarath Amunugama, Minister
of Enterprise Development and Investment Promotion, whose
Ministry oversees the investment promotion agency.
While the relocation has been a socially progressive move,
it has also resulted in a massive increase in the production
capacity of the enterprise to over 200 metric tonnes per day.
This amounts to a doubling of the company’s production.
CGC is Piramal Enterprise’s first venture outside India.
Technology, which has been developed in India, is now available
in Sri Lanka, making the island the only location in Asia
to have this technology. Piramal Glass is a leading glass
manufacturer based in India having manufacturing plants in
USA, Sri Lanka and of course, India.
The initial products made by Ceylon Glass after the takeover
by Piramal Glass Ltd [Erstwhile Gujarat Glass Ltd], the Indian
Company, were soft drink and liquor bottles. But Ceylon Glass
Company is a very versatile company that has catered to the
needs of a wide range of sectors, ranging from the alcohol
industry to breweries, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, food products
and beverage.
The company has the ability to meet demands, both small and
large. Typically, a small order is for 2 days run but can
also meet higher runs, depending on the needs of customers.
The new dynamism in the company came about in 1999, when Piramal
Glass Ltd acquired Ceylon Glass Company. The company benefited
from the technical know-how of Gujarat Glass, which is a global
industry leader in the manufacture of bottles. It has Asia’s
largest amber bottle manufacturing furnace that is in a single
location, having a capacity of 240 tonnes a day. Piramal Glass
operates 11 glass-manufacturing facilities across the world
that includes two plants in the United States and one in Sri
Lanka.
Production is now much more diverse and caters to an entire
range of Pharmaceuticals, Cosmetics and Perfumes, Aerated
Drinks, Liquor, Wine, Foods and Agro Container requirements.
There has also been an increase in the types of glasses produced
by CGC that include Cobalt Blue, Dark Blue, Dead Leaf Green,
Olive Green colour bottles to various global customers.
The company’s new plant located on 26 acres of land represents
an investment of Rs 3.7 billion. The new facility will result
in an increase of up to 250 tons of glass per day. It will
also result in increased flexibility for bottle manufacturing,
with CGC being able to meet the demand for more innovative
designs. The key feature of this new state of the art manufacturing
plant is the ability to process five varieties of bottles
simultaneously in a single production process.
Ceylon Glass Company, which achieved the ‘Superbrand’
status, has added to its services a team of professional designers
to create innovative designs to meet the design requirements
of both large and small-scale buyers.
Tiwari added that they also operated a Sand Processing Plant
at Nattandiya. Ceylon Glass Company Limited, as an environmentally
conscious enterprise, has actively engaged in the recycling
of glass. The company promotes glass recycling through a door-to-door
collection process and said that they collect from the entire
country.
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