Nirma, Voltas, Engineers India

NIRMA Successful Streamlining The continuing sluggish performance of the fast moving consumer goods sector has not dampened the spirit of detergents and soaps major Nirma. Margins of the company are dependent on commodity prices, which get affected by the fluctuations based on global economic conditions. This was why the company embarked on its backward integration programme a few years back. The company, which is now self-reliant for its requirements of major raw materials like linear alkyl benzene and soda ash, is now targeting other areas of improvement. During the year under review, it increased the capacity of the soda ash plant from 4,20,000 tonne per annum (tpa) to 6,50,000 tpa resulting in lower cost of production of soda ash by around 12 per cent and thereby reaping benefits from economies of scale. The company has also been consciously following the strategy of lowering the dependence of imported raw materials. Consumption of imported raw materials, which constituted around 20 per cent in 2000-01, came down to 15 per cent in 2001-02 and has been further reduced to 14 per cent during 2002-03.