Ramco Cements Ltd plans to invest around Rs 3,500 crore to boost its capacity to 20 million tonnes by 2020.

Currently, the company has a capacity of 12 million tonnes across all its plants.

Speaking to reporters after launching its new premium blended cement, Ramco Supercrete, here, P R Venketrama Raja, chaiman & managing director, The Ramco Cements Ltd, said that a major portion of its investment would be funded through internal accruals, while balance would be funded through debt.

“The uncertainty has ended and stability is back at the Centre. We expect the new government to focus on major infrastructure projects that will spur growth in the cement sector,” he said.

A V Dharmakrishnan, CEO, The Ramco Cements Ltd said that during the current fiscal, while the cement industry was likely to report a 7% - 8% growth, Ramco Cements was expected to post a 10% to 12% growth.

“Our expansion programme is on track. The West Bengal unit is already on stream. We expect Odisha plant to be ready by October. Vishakapatnam plant will be ready by December, Jayanthipuram by July 2020 and Kurnool by March 2021,” Dharmakrishnan said.

The Ramco Cements Limited had reported a 9% drop in its net profit for the year ended March 31, 2019 to Rs 505.89 crore as compared to Rs 555.66 crore in the previous fiscal. However, due to 19% growth in volume sale to 11.12 million tonne as compared to 9.31 million tonne, the revenue during the year grew 16% to Rs 5,175 crore as compared to Rs 4,443 crore in fiscal 2018.