Bosowa Group outlines cement expansion plans, Indonesia

The Bosowa Group of Indonesia has outlined plans to increase its footprint on the Indonesian cement market as it prepares to compete with some of the major players on the Java market.

The group has said it will spend US$1bn on expansion for strategic sectors such as cement, infrastructure, mining finance and automative within the next five years.

Bosowa, which currently operates a cement plant in South Sulawesi and a grinding plant in Batam, planst to build new factories in Rembang (Central Java), Banyuwangi/East Java, Cilegon/Banten West Java and Maros/South Sulawesi with a total investment of more than US$500m. These investments would increase Bosowa’s production capacity to 15Mt by 2012 and increase its market share from seven per cent at present to 15 per cent.

Furthermore, it plans to build packing plants in Balikpapan/East Kalimantan, Pontianak/West Kalimantan, Kupang/East Nusa Tenggara, Mataram/West Nusa Tenggara, Manado/North Sulawesi and Sorong/West Paua at a cost of about US$10m each.

The company recently said it was ready to move beyond its initial cement strategy of avoiding direct competition with well-established rivals Semen Gresik, Indocement and Holcim. “We are ready to compete with rivals that have a huge presence in Java”, the company said.