Tile manufacturer plans to construct plant in RP

CEBU, Philippines - White Horse Ceramic Industries mulls exploring the possibility of putting up a plant expansion in the Philippines after it established a distribution network through a partnership with Cebu Oversea Hardware Co.

White Horse manager for overseas branches Lawrence Lim said, during the launching of the partnership and contract signing of distribution exclusivity between White Horse Malaysia and Cebu Hardware Oversea Co., that they might consider the possibility of opening a tile manufacturing plant here in the Philippines.

He said that considering the dense population of the country and the growing shopper’s trend towards sophisticated and value for money construction items, the Philippines could be considered as another growth area where their company can expand operations in the future.

“Whenever we decide to open new plants anywhere in the world, we consider a lot of factors and one of which is population. Here in the Philippines there is ample number of people so there is a good potential for us to someday start a new plant here,” said Lim.

“Filipino people are now getting more affluent in their preferences and they now like quality so there could be a growing market for our products here. But we will consider opening or starting a new plant here depending on the feasibility studies that will be done which will consider the low production cost, marketability and the availability of raw materials,” he further added.

He said that opening a new plant is not an easy decision because a company has to consider the viability of the investment as well as the operating cost that will be incurred.

“There should be availability of clay which compose the bulk of raw materials in our tile products as well as the low cost of energy because this is a big price component in our manufacturing operations,” said Lim.

Lim said that so far, they are currently looking at two to three areas in the Asia Pacific region for new plant expansions to supply the growing demand of the tile industry for the next five years.

He said that in their current capacity of 60 million square meters per annum, their existing plants still could not cope up with the market demand that is why they continue to look for strategic areas where they can open up new plants to further boost production.

“The production in our plants currently could not supply all our markets so we still look for other areas to grow. While many companies and factories are shutting off or are pressurized to cost cut on their quality to bring down their operating costs in a recession, we continue to increase our operations and maintain our high quality standard,” said Lim.

White Horse is one of the leading ceramic tile manufacturers in the Asia Pacific region with over 50 years of experience having been established in 1947 and is an ISO certified company.

The company has manufacturing plants in Taiwan, Malaysia, and Vietnam; which is supported by their worldwide distribution offices cum warehouses in Singapore, Thailand, Philippines, Indonesia, Cambodia and Australia.

Recently, White Horse opened up another new plant in Malaysia and they now distribute their wide array of tile products across the world such as the European market which includes France and England.

White Horse also recently obtained an inkjet printing technology that replicates natural materials like wood, stones and among others into the tile and this is set to be commercially produced this month and will be launched in the worldwide market in August. — Rhia de Pablo