Indian dyes major acquires US operations of DyStar Group

Kiri Dyes and Chemicals Ltd (KDCL), a leading, Ahmedabad-based dyes and intermediates player, announced Tuesday the acquisition of the US operations of DyStar Group for $10 million.

''It is our intention to build a sustainable dyes and chemicals global oganisation,'' said Manish Kiri, managing director, KDCL. ''For that, we needed a powerful sales organisation in North and Central America and maintain the retailer connection."

Earlier this year, KDCL had acquired DyStar and its global subsidiaries, except the US operations. According to Kiri, Kiri-DyStar will now act as a global consolidator of the dyes business, aggressively cutting costs, coupled with off-shoring of production.

''As has been demonstrated by our two DyStar purchases this year, we are deep-value buyers, who look to buy assets with great brands and good distribution, all at rock bottom prices,'' adds Kiri. The DyStar group is expected to save direct costs of over $70 million in over two years mainly on account of reduction of employee costs and trnsfer of production to a low-cost region.

The US operations of DyStar generates revenues of more than $100 million. The acquisition will boost KDCL's consolidated revenues to $1 billion in fiscal 2011.

Ruan Weixiang, co-chairman and co-owner of DyStar, said he was confident the acquisition would generate more value to its customers around the world with improved quality and solutions.

DyStar is a leader for dyes, dyes solutions, leather, performance chemicals, new technologies and custom manufacturing of special dyes/pigments with about 21 per cent market share globally. It provides high quality products and services across the whole value chain in various sectors like apparel, hosiery, automotive, carpets and home upholstery as well as industrial fabrics.

It has sales and technical support presence in all key markets; agencies in 50 countries and 17 production facilities in 14 countries with a total employee strength of around 2,450.