Colombia’s business and industry regulator has approved cement company Argos’ offer to acquire all assets and liabilities of firms Cementos Andino and Concrecem, Argos announced on its website. Since the US$192m deal was subject to approval from the related authorities, "details will be released in the next few days on the procedures necessary to close this transaction," the firm said.

The deal will include all of the productive cement and concrete assets of Cementos Andino and Concrecem, including mines, mining licenses, cement plants, concrete plants and distribution systems. The agreement will also include the payment of Cementos Andino’s debts, which amount to over US$50m. Once the deal goes through Argos is expected to have total production capacity of some 9Mt of cement and 1.5M cu m of concrete a year, representing about 55-59 per cent of the national market.

The assets of Cementos Andino and Concrecem include three cement plants in San Gil, Cajicá and Sabanagrande, as well as five concrete plants: two in Bogotá, and one each in Sabanagrande, Santa Marta and Pereira.