HFCL planning heavy investment for expansion of optical fibre cable manufacturing

Telecom gear maker HFCL will invest Rs 35 crore on expanding optical fibre manufacturing facility to 10.5 million route fibre kilometre by June this year, the company said in a filing Monday. Himachal Futuristic Communications Ltd (HFCL) said the board of the company in its meeting held Monday "approved the proposal of enhancing additional manufacturing capacity of Optical Fibre Cable (OFC) at Hyderabad from 7 million Fibre Kilometre (fkm) to 10.5 million fkm where the company is already setting up optical fibre (OF) and OFC manufacturing facilities".

The company has an existing production capacity of 8 million fkm approximately and working with utilisation capacity of 96 per cent. It is already working on adding 7 million fkm which the board has now enhanced by another 3.5 million fkm. With this increment, the company will have a total production capacity of 18.5 fkm by June 2019. "Additional investment required for enhancement of capacity is Rs 35 crore," the filing said.

Besides, addition in OFC production, the board of the company approved an interim dividend of Rs 3.25 per share on cumulative redeemable preference shares (CRPS) of Rs 100 each for the financial year 2018-19. HFCL board also approved redemption of over 60.37 lakh or 6.5 per cent CRPS of Rs 100 each worth Rs 60.38 crore. "Out of 60,37,500 CRPS, 48,75,000 CRPS shall be redeemed on January 18, 2019, and balance 11,62,500 CRPS shall be redeemed on March 31, 2019," the filing said.

(With inputs from agencies.)