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[March 2004]
New Brick Plant in Romania Nears Capacity for Wienerberger; Second Plant Acquired
Wienerberger AG (Vienna, Austria) has been represented in Romania since 1998 by its wholly owned subsidiary, Wienerberger sisteme de caramizi SRL. Until recently, this sales company imported products for the Romanian market from the Wienerberger company in Hungary.
In order to eliminate the high freight costs, construction was started on a new brick plant in Guta Ocnitei, some 80km north west of Bucharest, at the end of 2002 with participation by the EBRD (European Bank for Reconstruction and Development). In developing this project, the company has primarily used equipment from a plant shutdown in Germany.
The new Romanian facility started operations in autumn 2003 and the company has announced that it will reach full capacity this year. The product line includes Romanian standard formats as well as large-sized hollow bricks and non-load-bearing bricks. Plans call for a gradual increase in production volume over the next two years. Capital expenditure for this project now totals €18 million.
Meanwhile, in February 2004 Wienerberger acquired another brick plant at Sibiu in Transylvania, the second most economic region in Romania after Bucharest. The investment for the acquisition and related capex for upgrade and optimisation of this plant totals €9 million.
These moves were announced just after the acquisition in Germany of the hollow brick activities in Malsch and Ansbach of the Trost Group, which have a total capacity of 220 million brick units. In 2003 the company recorded revenues of €25 million with 120 employees.
Trost is the second largest brick producer in south west Germany and adjusted capacity in 2002 to meet market conditions.
The debt-free purchase price for the plants and inventories, which were acquired in the form of an asset deal, totalled around €27 million.
ENDS