The Hindu Business Line : KPR's mega garment complex getting ready

Coimbatore May 21 Come December, KPR group might have passed a new milestone in capacity building among the southern textile enterprises as the Tirupur-based textile conglomerate's 14-lakh sq.ft. integrated knitted garment complexwillbe fully functional.

The production facility being built as part of the Rs 472-crore expansion plan will include 4-lakh sq.ft./1,440-seated garment making unit (turning out one lakh pieces a day) and one-lakh spindled-ultra-modern yarn spinning complex on a 44-acre land-spread at the peripheral Arasur industrial belt, some 25 km from here.

The expansion plan is being chalked out under the flagship KPR Mill Ltd.

Windmills

"Our yarn production would get doubled from 75 tonnes per day to 150 tonnes and the annual garment output to treble from 12 million pieces to 37.9 million pieces by 2007-08 which will also see the number of wind mills under our company going up from 27 to 39 yielding 39 MW of energy after expansion,'' said Mr P. Nataraj, Managing Director of KPR Mill. The company's other production facilities are located at Sathyamangalam, Tirupur, Karumathampatti and Neelambur. With nearly 80 per cent of the Arasur integrated knitted garment complex work having been completed (a portion of spinning and garment unit already started working), the integrated apparel company boasts of having reduced its power cost one-sixth of what it would have otherwise been paying had it used the grid power.

Textile processing

Thanks to wind energy, KPR's per unit power cost is hardly 53 paise compared to the TNEB's Rs 3.50 a unit. The expansion project will enable the company to set up textile processing plant (23 tonnes per day capacity) at Perundurai SIPCOT industrial estate. According to Mr Nataraj, the new processing facility that will further bolster its garment value chain, will start operating by July.

Cotton godown

The textile major has also located a 1.15-lakh sq.ft. cotton godown at its Arasur unit that stocks the raw material sufficient to feed the unit for eight full months. This is because the unit strongly believes in single mixing of cotton to maintain uniformity in the fibre that goes into its products. The products are supplied to global garment retailers such as Carrefour, Penney, C&A and Mothercare.

KPR, which has closed the fiscal 2006-07 with Rs 512-cr turnover, has drawn Rs 105-crore funding from the US private equity players for part financing its Rs 472-crore expansion which is being carried out partly by internal accruals (Rs 72 crore) and by term lending (Rs 348 crore).

More Stories on : New Projects | Knitwear & Hosiery | Textiles | Tamil Nadu

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