India: Dalmia OCL merger

The boards of Dalmia Bharat Ltd and OCL India have decided to merge the two entities, creating the fourth-largest cement manufacturer in India with a total capacity of 25Mta and annual revenues of approximately INR100bn (US$1.5bn).

OCL will merge with Dalmia Bharat and will issue fresh shares for public shareholders in lieu of their ownership in OCL. Public shareholding in OCL stands at a little over 25 per cent. Dalmia Bharat will not be issuing any fresh shares against its own 74.9 per cent stake OCL.

Dalmia Bharat has expanded in size and scale over recent years and sees now as the time for consolidation, according to Puneet Dalmia, managing director of Dalmia Bharat Group. “Currently we are operating at 58 per cent capacity utilisation and we are looking at increasing the capacity utilisation that will bolster profit margin,” he said.