Asahi Glass plans shutdown of Americas glass units

17 April 2008 12:49  [Source: ICIS news]

TOKYO (ICIS news)--Japan’s Asahi Glass Co (AGC) will drastically cut its float glass and architectural coating operations in North America due to the continued decline in the housing market in the region, a spokesman for the chemical producer said late on Thursday.

It would stop operations at three float glass production plants and two architectural coating lines in North America and would sell its glass fabrication business by the end of the year, the spokesman added.

However, the company was yet to finalise its sale plans, the spokesman said.  

It would stop float glass production at its plants in Victorville in California Augustine in Quebec and at its No 1 plant in Greenland, Tennessee, he added.

This would decrease the company’s total float glass production capacity in North America to 834,500 tonnes/year from the present 1.43m tonnes/year, the spokesman said.

The coating units at Victorville and Hampton in Iowa would also stop production, decreasing the total capacity to 7.1m square meters/year from 18.4m square meters/year, he added.

After these plants were closed, AGC would have four float glass production lines and one coating line in North America, he said.

AGC planned to concentrate its management resources on producing glass for solar cells, the sales of which were expected to grow rapidly, as well as raw glass for automotive applications and value-added products for construction purposes, the company said in a statement.

AGC’s flat glass business in North America, which includes the float glass production, is operated by AGC Flat Glass North America.

Most modern windows are made from float glass, which is manufactured by floating molten glass on a bed of molten tin.

By: Tomomi Yokomura
+65 6780 4359

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