Poster in Dec 03, 2023 15:16:37

"Success means Quality Control and Timely Delivery to our customer"

"Success means Quality Control and Timely Delivery to our customer"

Pravin Sheth (Chartered Accountant) is a stalwart and pioneer in the Industry with experience of more than 5 decades.  He is always been a visionary as his company was the first in the industry to start manufacturing non-woven-based fabrics. The first plant in India was established in Daman with an 85K sq ft area.

Fiberweb(India) is a leader in Non-woven Fabrics in the International Market. In today's economic crisis, the company has "Zero Debt and very high liquidity".

The company is working hard today along with its vendors to support India in this epidemic by increasing the production of key safety requirements e.g. PPE KIT, N95 & N-99 masks for our Corona fighters. 

Can you tell us something about Fiberweb and its history?

Fiberweb (India) is around 34 year old company. The company initially was manufacturing conventional polymer products, & we then moved on to manufacturing monolayer & multilayer films. This was followed by an ambitious pioneer project: the Manufacturing of spunbond nonwoven fabrics, a product many people in India at that time had not even heard of.

From 1996 we have had 100% EOU, the company exports in the United States, Europe, UAE, Australia, etc & across the world. Since it's an Export Based company the plant has been created and maintained as per the international standards required. We have reinvested in modernization and de-bottlenecking.

In 2016 the company did an expansion in Meltdown. Today they have a capacity of around 5000MTPA in Spunbond fabrics & 1500MTPA for Meltblown fabrics in our facility at Daman. 

Where are the products manufactured by you, used?

The Geotextile market in India was around 3.65lakhs MT in 2016 with a growth of around 16% per annum, but most of the production is mainly low-end non-woven fabrics. Which is used for shopping bags & carpets & backings etc

Today Fiberweb(India) has mainly two product segments: 

1. Spunbond fabrics: It is mainly used in Agriculture applications - crop cover, soil cover, Industrial garments, PPE Kits, Hospital Garments, Masks like in N95 & N99, personal hygiene applications like baby diapers, female hygiene & adult diapers, Textile applications & Geo-technical and structural applications, etc.

2. Meltblown fabrics: This product today is most in demand which is used for N95 & N99 masks & PPE kits. It is also used in Oil Absorbents, Medical fabrics, Wipes, filtration, sanitary products, apparel, etc. The Meltblown fabrics have multiple uses and Fiberweb is the only company in India producing Meltblown fabrics as per international standards.

What has been the impact on business due to coronavirus?

Yes, we have a positive impact due to corona. Both our products are used in WHO standard Masks such as  N95 & N99 masks. Both the masks require around 175-180 MM Meltblown fiber. The standard procedure to prepare a mask is that Spunbond is used to create the upper and lower while the middle layer is through Meltblown fiber. 

Fiberweb (India) is one of the players in India today in Meltblown fabric. Hence that's the reason we are booked for the next 6 months.

Have you been able to run your business normally under the lockdown?

Our products come in the essential products list, so the government is helping us to run our factory 24*7.

With the Government norms naturally, whatever norms the Human resource ministry issues, we have to follow, but we are very much happy with the work done by government officials.

How have the lower crude prices impacted our input costs?

Our product is a crude crude-related product and input costs currently are comparatively lower. Still, in the international market, the prices of the final product are decided after considering the input cost which includes the raw material, etc. 

What is your business strategy for the next 2-3 years? Kindly elaborate.

We are planning to double the production of melt-blown fabrics which is expected to be completed within the next 1-2 months. After the capacity expansion, the production is expected to be around 3000MTPA. We are also planning to make PPE kits in our facilities in Daman. 

The Company has planned to enter new product segments of  Flat Bond Fabrics for that they have already planned infrastructure in Daman & also have initiated the first step to get "BBB- Outlook stable" to the done from India ratings & research. This is required at this stage of business expansion.

Does the company need any additional capital in the next 24 months? Debt or equity?

Yes, definitely for flat bond fabrics expansion we require additional capex, but we will do it through internal accrual and if required then Debt funding. Hopefully by March 2022 the entire project will be completed and then commissioning of the plant.

The interview is published courtesy of the Konexio network


Source: Online/NAN

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