New Delhi, Dec 13: Welspun Flooring, a part of line pipes and home textiles major Welspun group, is investing Rs 200 crore to enhance its production capacity, according to a senior company official.
The company, which had forayed into the flooring segment a couple of years back with an investment of Rs 1,150 crore at a plant in Hyderabad, is also witnessing good traction of its products in the international market, partly driven by anti-China sentiment in the global supply chain.
“Incremental investments are happening. We are expanding on the hard flooring side. Those are happening between now and June next year. We are currently at 3 million square metre capacity on the hard flooring. We will be ramping up this capacity into 12 million square metres,” Welspun Flooring CEO-International Business Mukesh Savlani told PTI.
When asked about investment the company is putting in for the expansion, he said, “The additional investment will be about Rs 200 crore for hard flooring and also for soft flooring, for which we are adding our capability.”
Welspun Flooring had entered the market with stone polymer composite luxury performance tiles, carpet tiles, wall to wall carpets and artificial grass.
When asked about the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, Savlani said, “Things are looking up bright now. When we were just about to take off, this COVID hit us but that is behind us now. For sure, things are looking bright and we are looking at both international and the Indian side.”
International exports volumes are multiplying month-on-month basis now, mainly driven by markets like the US, Europe and the Middle East which largely remained open even when India was under lockdown.
Moreover, he said, “We do feel all the supply chains in the world are following a strategy of ‘China plus one’. This will be visible in flooring also.”
Savlani, however, said the anti-China sentiment aside, India has to make sense as far as competitiveness is concerned.
“We were able to address competitiveness through our manufacturing facility in India and while anti-China did give us a start, we have to continue on our merits and ensure we get this sustained momentum going forward,” he added.
Many Chinese players are also setting up plants in Vietnam and the US in order to overcome hurdles of the trade war between the US and China, he said adding, “So competitiveness will be required to continue and sustain the momentum. So far we have set up meaningful long-term partnerships and we don’t see an issue over there.”
Commenting on the revenue expectations, he said, “We should be looking at around Rs 250 crore by end of the year. This will be 2.5 times of last year. Next financial year we are looking at over Rs 500-600 crore.”
Currently, the company’s international revenues are higher than domestic but in three to four years it will be 50-50, Savlani said.
Welspun Flooring is planning to ramp up its distribution network by adding 500 more retail points to take it to about 1,000 retail points by the end of next year, he said. (PTI)
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