Orica boosts explosives punch with 3 jv's

01 October 1999 09:26  [Source: ICIS news]

SINGAPORE (CNI)--Australian chemical major Orica Ltd announced Friday that it is in three foreign joint ventures which position its backbone explosives business for further earnings growth.

Managing director and chief executive officer Philip Weickhardt said his company has firmed:

• A 49.0% share in a company, finalised earlier this (27 September) week, with ICI India that will produce and sell commercial explosives in the expanding Indian market.
• A 49.0% stake in a company with Germany's Dynamit Nobel GmbH Explosivstoff und Systemtechnik (DNES), which will be a source of electronic detonator production for global markets. Formation of this joint venture is subject to German government and European Community approvals.
• A 27.7% holding in a venture - which is already in business - with Nelson Brothers of the US to expand the distribution of Orica's industrial explosives in that market.

Weickhardt said: "The ventures are important parts of Orica's overall strategy and will enable us to develop opportunities for the explosives business through technology, market expansion and product distribution efficiencies."

The Indian joint venture, Indian Explosives Ltd, will manufacture and market commercial explosives at three sites, and includes ICI India's 70.0% shareholding in IES India, an explosives initiating systems joint venture with Ensign Bickford.

The German company will be a joint venture between DNES and Orica's wholly-owned European subsidiary, Orica Europe Ltd. The electronic detonators it will produce have been developed jointly by the partners.

The US joint venture, Nelson Brothers Mining Services (NBMS), is headquartered in Gillette, Wyoming. Orica's stake is held through its US subsidiary, Energetic Solutions Inc. NBMS services open-pit mines in the key western US markets of Wyoming, Montana, North Dakota and South Dakota.

By: Lawrence Basapa
+65 6780 4359

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