Rehau Polymer SRL, the Romanian branch of the German concern, last year registered turnover worth about 18 million euros, up 80% from 2002, according to sources within the group. The surge occurred after Rehau's switch from a sales structure exclusively based on imports to the position of manufacturer.
The financial results exceeded the initial expectations, which had pointed to turnover worth 13 million euros. Rehau is thus consolidating its position on the domestic market, also operating exports standing at 3 million euros. The retail markets of the group's domestic branch are Slovakia, Hungary, Ukraine or Greece, where the company supplied piping to the Olympic village that is being built for the 2004 Olympic Games.
The company's portfolio is quite diversified, since it operates on the market of polyethylene pipe products, of electrical, thermal and underground installations, where it competes against Romstal and Energi Co. Rehau is an important player, holding a share of about 20% of the sales of PVC shapes, according to its own estimates, behind Gealan, the market leader.
The company dedicated a plant in Sibiu in the second half of last year, following a greenfield investment worth 5.5 million euros, which made it the second-largest foreign investor on the PVC and polyethylene piping market, estimated to be worth about 50 million euros per year, according to some calculations. PipeLife international group (a joint venture between Austrian company Wienerberger and the Belgian-based Solvay) has been operating as a producer on the domestic market since 1998 through its Miercurea Ciuc-based plant, with an initial capacity of 3,500 tonnes per year.
Operators such as Valrom or Teraplast, together with Palplast Sibiu, part of private oil group Rompetrol, also hold significant market shares, of about 20-25%.
The Sibiu-based Rehau plant has a capacity of 3,500 PVC tonnes and of 1,500 tonnes of polyethylene. After it started production, the group's staff in Romania doubled to about 100 employees.
Rehau entered the Romanian market in 1996, and had invested more than 11million euros by the end of last year. adrian.mirsanu@zf.ro
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