Romania’s last operating fertilizers producer, Azomures, owned by Swiss Ameropa but eyed for takeover by Romgaz, resumed operation at 30% capacity after an outage of nearly one year caused by high raw material (natural gas) prices. At the beginning, the plant started producing ammonia, which is a precursor to the manufacture of complex fertilizers.
Ameropa has operated the Azomures plant on and off during the past years, depending on the circumstances of the natural gas market. Now it reportedly uses domestic natural gas, in the amount of some 1 million cubic meters per day, the factory’s nameplate capacity being 3.5 million cubic meters, Economedia.ro reported.
State-controlled Romgaz, the largest natural gas producer in Romania, is considering taking over Azomures, either in full or in part, to diversify the range of value-added activities based on its natural gas production. The company has launched, for now, a tender for the contracting of consulting services necessary to prepare the negotiation of the takeover and restart of the Azomureș chemical fertilizer plant.
“Romgaz is analyzing the possibility of developing its businesses in the chemical industry, intending to acquire a series of assets/assets that compete with the production activity of Azomureș,” the tender documentation states, as quoted by Profit.ro.
The analysis will have to take into account the synergies that can be obtained as a result of the integration of the acquired assets into the Romgaz activity, the company also requested.
“The consultant will analyze the current business model and propose possible improvements to it, identifying risks, opportunities, strengths, and weaknesses as a result of the acquisition of the assets,″ the cited source states.
Azomures has a production capacity of 1.8 million tonnes of fertilizers per year, 75% of the production being delivered to the local market, to distributors in Romania, and the rest to the regional market, to countries such as Serbia, Hungary, Bulgaria, or Ukraine.
The industrial platform is located in Târgu Mureș, covers an area of 100 hectares, and includes a complex of facilities for the production of fertilizers for agriculture (NPK, ammonium nitrate, nitrolim, granulated urea) and some industrial products (melamine, technical urea, ammonia water, nitric acid, and others).
iulian@romania-insider.com
(Photo source: Facebook/Azomures)
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