Kesoram asked to clarify Birla tyre plant ‘revival’ news

The BSE has requested a clarification from India’s Kesoram Industries Ltd regarding a news article that states the company is reviving a project to manufacture passenger car tyres at its Basalore Birla Tyres plant.

Mumbai-based publication dna wrote today that in light of deleveraging following the September 2015 sale of Kesoram’s Cavendish Industries Ltd subsidiary and Haridwar tyre factory to JK Tyre & Industries, which netted the company Rs 22 billion (£218.9 million), the company plans to refocus on its “Balasore car tyre project” in Odisha. According to dna, production is expected to start at the plant early in the next fiscal year (which begins on 1 April 2016); it adds that work on the project began in 2009 but was shelved due to a slowdown within India’s automotive market and as a result of a court case.

“Despite selling Haridwar plant to JK Tyre, we never removed our focus from the tyre industry and in the early part of the next financial year we would be launching our own passenger car tyre,” a company official told dna.

The factory in Balasore was set up in collaboration with Pirelli in 1991 and currently holds the capacity to produce cross-ply commercial vehicle tyres. The company is currently working towards launching a premium truck tyre brand, Platina, which will be produced in the plant. A March 2016 market launch is expected.

At the time of writing the stock exchange has received no clarification from Kesoram Industries.