Emal production reaches full range

Dubai: Emirates Aluminium (Emal) yesterday said its on-site cast house is now producing its full range of products, allowing the company to supply clients in a wide variety of industries.

Sow, standard ingots, sheet ingots and extrusion billets are all being cast and delivered to clients. These four products mean that Emal can now supply clients in industries ranging from automobile and CD manufacturing to pharmaceutical production.

"Having a four-product range allows us to offer our clients flexibility," Saeed Al Mazroui, the CEO and President of Emal, said. "When one of our customers receives our product, they need to re-melt it to create the final product. Different industries have different needs when it comes to this process. Sow ingots are widely used in the automotive industry, but a canning company typically wants sheet ingot. By offering these four products, we allow ourselves to cater to a number of important industrial sectors."

Emal is currently ramping up to full production in both its smelter and cast house, but once full production for phase one is achieved, the cast house's output will be 13 per cent sow, 30 per cent standard ingot, 38 per cent extrusion billets and 19 per cent sheet ingot.

Emal's marketing team will take to the road this month to meet prospective clients in European markets in order to explain the product offering and customisation possibilities.

The European market push will culminate in the co-exhibiting — along with Dubal — Aluminium 2010 in Essen, Germany.

Emal will join 650 exhibitors from over 40 countries at the trade show.

"Essen is a huge opportunity for our marketing team; as we near full production, Europe is becoming an increasingly important market for us," said Al Mazroui. "Having our full product range on offer for perspective clients who are attending the trade fair is very timely and will certainly aid in our overall marketing success while we're there."

Emal is a joint venture between Dubai Aluminium Company Limited (Dubal) and Mubadala Development Company and was established in February 2007 to construct what will become the world's largest single site aluminium smelter complex. The project will be completed in two phases and utilise Dubal DX technology. Phase one started production in December 2009 and, once finished Emal, will produce 750,000 tonnes of aluminium per annum and 1.5 million tonnes annually at the end of phase two. The aluminium complex, a 6 square kilometres site in the Khalifa Port Industrial Zone in Al Taweelah, half way between Abu Dhabi and Dubai, will produce primary aluminium with a product mix of sow, standard ingot, tee ingot, extrusion billet and sheet ingot.