Finolex to Spend 390 Cr on Fibre Preforms Plant, Electron Beam Tech for Solar Cables
Finolex Cables Limited, an Indian manufacturer of electrical and telecommunication cables has announced an investment of Rs. 390 crore at its Urse facility in Pune. Out of this Rs. 290 Crores will be spent on a new fibre preform* plant and about 100 Crore will be spent on expanding its solar cables manufacturing capacity.
*Optical fibre Preforms are thick hollow glass rods from which optical fibre strands is drawn.
New Fibre Preform Plant to Fulfill Finolex’s In-house Demand
Finolex currently has a capacity of producing 8 million fibre Kilometer per annum (fkm/p.a.) of optical fibre cable manufacturing at its Urse facility. The preforms used to make these optical fibres are sourced from outside currently by Finolex. Therefore, with the new glass preform plant the company will try to fulfill its in-house demand for preforms.
In an analyst conference call held on 27th May 2023, Mr. Deepak Chhabria, Executive Chairman, Finolex Cables Ltd., announced that the new preform plant will be set up in two phases. First phase is expected to be completed in 15 months from date of commencement and will have initial capacity of 4 million fkm/p.a. Another 4 million fkm/p.a. will be added in the next one year which will be sufficient to meet the in-house demand of fibre preforms.
Finolex to Use Electron E-Beam Technology for Manufacturing Solar Cables
Finolex has also announced the expansion of its solar power cable manufacturing capacity at its Urse plant with INR 100 Cr. investment. Finolex stated that it would be using Controlled Electron e-beam technology for solar cable manufacturing for enhanced quality and efficiency. Mr. Deepak Chhabria in the aforementioned conference call informed that they are importing two Electron e-beam machinery from South Korea for this expansion after a failed attempt from procuring the same from China.
He further added that these machines may also be used to manufacture low-voltage power cables and specialised instrumentation cables and railway cables in the future.
About Finolex Cables Limited: Finolex Cables is a major player in the Indian cable industry and flagship company of Finolex Group. The company has manufacturing facilities at Pimpri and Urse in Pune, Goa, and Roorkee, Uttarakhand. The company has about 10,000 employees and cloaked a turnover of Rs. 4,481 crore in 2022-23 fiscal.