Spic Plans Rejig, Eyes Agriculture, Pharma Sectors

Southern Petrochemicals and Industries Corporation (Spic) is restructuring its businesses to cover four core areas agriculture, chemicals and petrochemicals, pharmaceuticals and services.

According to A C Muthiah, vice chairman and president, Spic, the company will be entering joint ventures with world leaders in these areas. This is despite Spics poor joint venture track record in India.

Spic-SMO, a division of Spic which is in the business of project management services and EPC contracts, on Monday signed a memorandum of understanding with Technipetrol, SpA Italy for a joint venture in the country. For Spic, signing of the MoU will mean spinning off the consultancy wing into a separate venture. Spic-SMO had a turnover of Rs 116 crore for the year 1996-97.

 

The joint venture company, to be called Technipetrol India, will have an initial equity of Rs 6 crore and will be headquartered in Chennai. The authorised capital will be Rs 10 crore.

To start with, the joint venture company will be able to offer about 500,000 engineering man-hours and envisages a turnover of Rs 180 crore in the first year of operations.

Technipetrol India will operate in sectors including oil and oil refining, gas processing, petrochemicals, fertilisers, power, pharmaceuticals, environmental engineering, food processing, textiles, etc.

The services on offer range from feasibility studies and financial services to project management and detail engineering.

EPC contracts and plant operation and maintenance will be other services that the company plans to offer.

EPC contract for the off-shore ammonia/urea complex that Spic Fertilisers and Chemicals is putting up at Dubai will be done by the joint venture

Technipetrols recent oil refinery contract in Egypt will also be executed by Technipetrol India.