Gypsum industry news

Brazil: Trevo Drywall has begun raising funds for the construction of a new gypsum wallboard plant in Southeast Brazil. The company’s existing gypsum wallboard plant at Juazeiro do Norte, Ceará, is currently undergoing expansion to 16Mm²/yr from 14Mm²/yr. The plant will transition to natural gas power in January 2022. Trevo Drywall plans to further increase its capacity to 20Mm²/yr before 2024. Prior to this, it will use resources from its cash generation and proprietary and third-party capital to build the new unit in the Southeast. The company says that its location will be ‘closer to the main drywall consumer centres in Brazil.’ Currently, more than 80% of its sales are outside of the Northeast. The producer holds an 11% share of the Brazilian gypsum wallboard market.

CEO Sávio Maia said “We have been expanding our production potential at a rate of 26% per year since 2014 and, despite all the macroeconomic difficulties that Brazil went through during this period, we have always used 100% of our installed capacity.” He added “We generate more than 220 direct jobs, which has a great effect on the lives of many families in Juazeiro do Norte and the surrounding region, either by the income generated directly and indirectly, or by the company's prominent role among the largest local taxpayers.”

Canada: Bob Bruce of Innogyps has announced that Robert Morrow has joined Innogyps as a partner. Innogyps says that Rob brings with him North American, European and Australasian regional experience and gypsum and construction products business experience with CertainTeed (BPB), Genstar Corporation and Arthur Young (Ernst & Young).

In addition to his undergraduate degree in commerce, Rob is a chartered accountant and has operations experience in supply chain and mining, business strategy and leadership development. Inogyps says that his diverse set of skills will assist Mark Flumiani and the rest of the team in providing an organisation to meet customer needs.

Australia: Building materials group Boral has cut 100 jobs from its Australian business, taking total job losses from its global operations to 1100 since January 2013. A company spokesperson confirmed the job cuts to the Australian Financial Review ahead of a presentation by chief executive Mike Kane in Sydney.

Kane's presentation revealed Boral's strategy, including ambitious growth targets for the Asian gypsum and US businesses. Its gypsum business holds a 40-45% market share in Asia with a wallboard production capacity of 625Mm2/yr.

Australia: Boral, Australia's largest building materials supplier, has said that it will cut 1000 jobs from its global operations this fiscal year as part of a restructuring initiative intended to improve competitiveness. It is hoped that the changes will save US$95m/yr, with estimated savings of US$39m in 2013.

CEO and managing director Mike Kane described the company as 'burdened' with excessive overhead costs. "While this may be less obvious during the good times, it becomes critically exposed when times are tough," he said. The restructuring follows a 100 day review of the business conducted by Kane.

The majority of job losses are in Australia, where 885 positions will be axed. This includes the 90 roles Boral said that it would cut in December 2012 as it announced plans to suspend the production of clinker at its Waurn Ponds cement plant in eastern Australia. 15 jobs will be cut in the US.

In June 2012 the company reported that it had 14,740 employees, with around 8730 in Australia. A further reduction of 1420 employees will also take place due to Boral's previously announced divestment of assets in Asia and Australia.

US: USG Corporation (USG) has announced the election of Matthew Carter Jr. to its board of directors. Carter will serve on the Audit and Governance committees of the USG board of directors. With his addition, USG's board now includes nine independent directors.

Carter is President, Sprint Global Wholesale & Emerging Solutions at Sprint Nextel Corporation. His leadership and experience spans more than 20 years across diverse industries with major companies such as Bristol Myers, Coca-Cola and Leap Wireless. Heavily involved in the telecommunications sector through his career, Carter holds a bachelor's degree from Northwestern University and a master of business administration from Harvard Business School.

"We are pleased to welcome Matt Carter to our board," said Jim Metcalf, chairman of the board, president and CEO of USG Corporation. "His history of leadership, vision, innovation and business transformation will be valuable assets as USG continues to create its own recovery and emerge as a stronger company."

France: Lafarge, the French building materials giant, has announced plans to restructure the group along national lines instead of product types. The move will be implanted from the start of 2012 and was described by Lafarge as 'the natural next step' following its geographical expansion and its recent refocusing on cement, aggregates and concrete. This has become more pertinent following the disposal of most of its gypsum activities, with only North America the only area in which it still has gypsum operations. The aim of the project is to increase Lafarge's differentiation through the development of higher value-added products and solutions for construction.

Bruno Lafont, chief executive at Lafarge, said that the project may have a 'limited' impact on staff numbers. "It is premature to speak of the consequences in terms of employment," said Lafont. "If there is an impact, we think it will be limited." Lafarge previously said that it would remove a layer of management at the 'regional' level as part of the reorganisation

USA: USG has announced that its chairman, William C Foote, will retire from the company on 1 December 2011. The USG board of directors has elected James S Metcalf, USG's President and Chief Executive Officer, to the additional post of Chairman of the Board effective upon Foote's retirement.

"It has been an honour and a privilege to lead this great company for the last 15 years," said Foote. "I have great confidence in the company's leadership team and its future. I will sincerely miss the many friendships I have developed throughout the company and the industry over the years. I will always be grateful to our board of directors for their steadfast support and wise counsel."

Foote has served as USG's chairman since 1996, after having been elected chief executive officer in 1995 and president in 1994. Foote has nearly 27 years of service, having joined USG in 1984. The youngest chairman in USG's 109-year history, Foote successfully led the company through periods of rapid growth, severe economic contraction and a Chapter 11 bankruptcy related to legacy legal liabilities.

Under Foote's leadership, USG launched a large-scale modernisation of its manufacturing operations in the late 1990s that added more than 1.5Bnm² of low-cost wallboard manufacturing capacity. Foote also directed the expansion of USG's specialty distribution business, L&W Supply Corporation, which now has more than 150 locations and is the only specialty dealer of building materials with a nationwide presence.

He also helmed the firm through the company's legacy asbestos liabilities and led the company through a Chapter 11 restructuring to protect shareholders from a wave of lawsuits. In a Wall Street Journal article at the time USG emerged from bankruptcy, Warren Buffet called it, "the most successful managerial performance in bankruptcy that I've ever seen." Buffett's investment company, Berkshire Hathaway Inc., owns a 16.2% in USG.

Metcalf, who joined the company in 1980 as a trainee, was elected to the USG Board of Directors in 2008 and became chief executive officer on 1 January 2011. Foote remains chairman of the board of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.

North America: France's Saint-Gobain has announced the appointment of John Crowe as President and CEO of both the Saint-Gobain Corporation, Saint-Gobain's North American holding company, and CertainTeed Corporation, which is Saint-Gobain's largest North American subsidiary.

Crowe will take on these two new roles effective from today. As President and CEO of Saint-Gobain Corporation, he will act as Saint-Gobain's representative in North America, overseeing the company's North American businesses and chairing the company's Executive Committee. In this role, he succeeds Gilles Colas, who will return to Saint-Gobain's Paris headquarters as Senior Vice President in charge of global strategic developments.

In addition, Crowe will assume operational responsibility for CertainTeed, following in the footsteps of Peter Dachowski, who retired yesterday after 35 years of service in a wide variety of senior leadership roles at Saint-Gobain and CertainTeed.

"With more than 30 years of experience in Saint-Gobain's innovative materials businesses, John is an exceptional leader with strong operational skills," said Pierre-Andre de Chalendar, Chairman and CEO of Saint-Gobain. "His appointment underscores Saint-Gobain's focus on leveraging its innovation and technical expertise to develop products and solutions that change the way we think about built environments. John will help CertainTeed and other Saint-Gobain businesses in North America to develop innovative materials that advance the way we build today in order to meet the challenges of tomorrow."

Crowe sees his main role as continuing to drive innovation throughout the company. "CertainTeed has been a leader in the construction industry for over one hundred years, Saint-Gobain for over three centuries, but we have never seen such a rapid pace of change or so many exciting new building technologies," he said.