Swiss wood processing group Kronospan will buy the two plants owned by Italian company Gruppo Frati in Sebes, Alba County, under a transaction worth 250 million euros.
The information was published on the website of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Reconstruction (EBRD), which provides financial backing for this project.
The transaction will enable the Swiss-based group to purchase SC MDF Sebes Frati SA, a medium density fibreboard and resin plant and SC Sepal SA, a particleboard plant.
Out of the total value of the project, 135 million euros will be provided by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, as a loan to the Swiss company.
Kronospan has committed to carrying out a financial restructuring plan at the two Sebes-based plants and to expand particleboard production by installing a second production line, with an annual capacity of 500,000 cubic metres.
The head of the Romanian division of the Frati group, Tomasso Tomaselli has indirectly confirmed the transaction. "The Frati group owns nine plants, but not all of them will be sold," Tomaselli said, without offering further details.
The Italian group invested about 200 million dollars in building the two plants in Sebes County. The Frati group began production in Romania in September 2000. In 2002, the group posted turnover worth 70 million dollars through its two factories in Sebes County, though company officials did not disclose last year's turnover.
About 50% of the Romanian plants' output is exported. The two plants held by Gruppo Frati in Sebes currently process approximately 750,000 tonnes of wood annually. When the plants start operating at full capacity, following the completion of the new chipboard production line, wood consumption will stand at up to 1,500,000 tonnes per year. The Sebes plants have some 400 employees and their shareholders are companies that are included in the Frati group.
In its turn, Kronospan, which is one of Gruppo Frati's main European rivals, last year voiced plans to build a particleboard plant in Romania, in Brasov. According to sources close to the project, the 200 million-euro investment was postponed because the Romanian authorities would not grant the incentives requested by the Swiss company.
Kronospan is one of the largest international groups that dominate wood-based panel production and the related businesses in Europe. The company's products are also imported in Romania.
The Krono Group was founded in 1897 by the Kaindl family in Austria. The group's companies operate in 11 different European countries, having a 14% market share in the EU and a 46% share in Central and Eastern European particleboard market.
Particleboard and fibreboard are materials largely employed in the production of furniture, with Romania currently able to produce some 750,000 cubic metres of such materials.
georgiana.stavarache@zf.ro
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