Hail Cement Company has announced that it has begun full commercial operations at its newly-developed cement plant yesterday.
The company raised around $130m when its shares were floated on the stock exchange in 2011 through the sale of half of its shares. The funds have been used to been used to create a rotary kiln cement plant, a 52MW power plant and $31.5m worth of on-site worker accommodation which includes 19 villas, 120 apartments for families, 108 single rooms for bachelors, a building of 12 studios for guests and two buildings of 24 studios for supervisors.
On February 5, the company said that trial operations at the plant were underway and yesterday it said that the rotary kiln had begun production, allowing the plant to commence full works.
Demand for cement in Saudi Arabia remains high as the country continues to deliver a wave of major infrastructure projects and begins a rapid scale-up to produce the 500,000 new homes that HRH King Abdullah has pledged to deliver by the end of 2015 in order to alleviate a housing shortage.
Last month, King Abdullah ordered that $800m in loans should be made available to allow cement companies to build four new plants with a view to boosting production capacity by 12m tonnes a day.
