Attock Cement is a prominent player in the cement industry and a shining star of the southern region with the company's facility located in Hub, Balochistan. The company established set-up in 1981 as a result of a joint venture between Pakistan and Saudi Arabia with an initial capital outlay of Rs1.5 billion including a foreign exchange component of $45 million and started commercial production in 1988 with a plant capacity of 2,000 tons per day of clinker. It has since kept its pace with the cement sector in Pakistan beefing up its capacity with modernisation. The current Hub facility has a production capacity of 1.74 million tons per annum.
ACPL is a part of the Pharaon Group, a group of companies that has investments in diversified fields such as cement, oil & gas, power generation and information technology. ACPL is listed on the Pakistan Stock Exchange.
The company primarily deals in the production of ordinary Portland cement, sulphate resistant cement and block cement and operates under the brand name Falcon. The brand has its market spread out across Pakistan and exports to South Africa, Sub-Saharan Africa, Iraq, the Gulf region reaching out to regional countries such as Sri Lanka and India. The company has several subsidiaries including Pakistan Oilfields Limited set up in 1950, Attock Refinery that was established in 1922, Attock Petroleum Limited that was established jointly by the Pharaon Investment Group Limited Holding (PIGL) and Attock Oil Group of Companies (AOC) in 1995. In 2005, the company also took over National Refinery Limited (NRL).
The company has been part of several large scale construction projects including HUBCO Power Company, Bahria Complex projects, Jinnah International Airport, Lyari Expressway and MCB Tower.
Six-year operational and financial performance
Production for both clinker and cement has grown in the past six years with clinker production growing by eight percent between 2010 and 2015 and cement production going up by five percent in this time period. FY15 was an exceptionally good year for the company recording its highest ever clinker production of 1.83 million tons, which stood at 1.7 million tons in FY10. Cement production was 1.87 million tons in FY15 compared to 1.79 million tons in FY10.
Combined domestic and export sales grew by four percent in the past six years with more than 60 percent of the sales contributing to the domestic market. Trends have been up for both domestic and export side with most notable growth registering between FY13 and FY15 where exports grew by 53 percent. Exports primarily went to South Africa but the recent slap of 63.53 percent anti-dumping duty will affect them in coming fiscals. Other export destinations for ACPL have been Iraq, Sri Lanka and Sub-Saharan African countries.