BEML to invest Rs680 crore on expense and diversification in two years

Public sector mining construction company Bharat Earth Movers Ltd (BEML) Ltd, today announced, plans to invest Rs680 crore in the next two to three years for expansion and diversification.

Included in the plans is second phase construction at Palakkad, where it has set up a new plant for defence equipment and a new manufacturing plant for aerospace components at Bangalore aerospace Special Economic Zone.

''With an order book of Rs5,206 crore in hand we expect to grow our sales by 18-20 per cent during the current year to touch Rs 4,200 crore. We are anticipating good business in the rail & metro business and mining & construction segment with the revival of the economy,'' V RS Natarajan, chairman and managing director, BEML Ltd told reporters, in Bangalore.

According to the plans, the company will invest Rs316 crore for aerospace components plant, Rs100 crore for revival of Mining and Allied Machinery Corporation (MAMC), a BEML acquisition in association Coal India Limited and power generating company Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC), and Rs100 crore for setting up an 18-Mw wind mill and the balance for modernisation of its factories.

The company has just commissioned its new manufacturing plant at Palakkad in Kerala for production of defence equipment. It intends to acquire another 600 acres of land there from the Kerala government for second phase expansion and shift its entire range of defence equipment there, Natarajan said.

The first phase, has seen BEML invest Rs260 crore to set up a 200,000 sq ft complex, its first manufacturing plant outside Karnataka.

Natarajan added that the MAMC acquisition has provided the company a good opportunity to step up its mining and construction equipment business. It expects to generate business of over Rs500 crore from Coal India alone for supply of mining equipment in the next 10 years. Coal India is expected to mine 700 million tonnes of coal in the next few years.