— By Plasteurope.com staff — 

In addition to a reorganisation, carbon black manufacturer Birla Carbon (Mumbai, Maharashtra; India; www.birlacarbon.com) said it is planning a review of its 19 production sites worldwide. Although the review has not yet been completed, the direction of the new strategy already appears clear. CEO John Loudermilk recently described market developments in Europe and the Americas as weaker, while characterising Asia as an emerging growth market.

Initially, the structure introduced in 2020 with six business areas will be consolidated into three regional units: Asia, Americas & EMEA, and Specialty Materials for carbon black products related to plastics as well as carbon nanotubes.

Between 2022 and 2024, Birla Carbon had already announced several expansion projects, primarily intended to strengthen production in Asia. However, none of these appears to have entered operation so far. The company did not respond to a corresponding Plasteurope.com query by press time.

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Among the projects were plans to build two new plants in India and Thailand, each with a capacity of 120,000 t/y, which would increase the total number of sites to 19. At the same time, the carbon black producer intended to expand its existing plants in Hungary, China, and India.

In terms of production capacity, Birla Carbon currently shares the global number one position with competitor Cabot (Boston, Massachusetts, USA; www.cabotcorp.com). Following consolidation at Cabot, both companies now have capacities of around 2.2 mn to 2.4 mn t/y. Third-placed Orion Engineered Carbons (Houston, Texas, USA; www.orioncarbons.com) trails significantly behind with approximately 1.4 mn t/y.