Govt, NAA sign deal on acquisition of Inalum

By Bambang Atmaja

The Indonesian Government and Japanese consortium Nippon Asahan Alumunium (NAA) on Thursday signed an agreement on the transfer of shares of the Japanese consortium in aluminum producer PT Inalum to the Government.

The agreement was signed by Minister for State Owned-Enterprises Dahlan Iskan and Hiroshi Haruta of NAA.

The 58.8 percent stake owned by NAA was valued at US$556.7 million. With the signing, the firm has become a state owned firm.

Dahlan said that 30 percent of the shares will be allocated for the regional administration of North Sumatra.

Going forward, PT Inalum plans to set up power plants, expanded its sea port capacity and construct an alumina refinery, a release from the ministry said.

The firm will kick off the construction of a 3x300 MW coal fired power plant in n 2015 to support the plan to ramp up the capacity of smelter from 250,000 metric tons per year to 425,000 metric tons in 2015. The power plant is expected to be completed in 2017.

At the sea port, the company plans to step up the capacity of its sea transport facility so that it can facilitate a ship with capacity of 35,000 tons from existing capacity of 25,500 tons. But the ministry did not elaborate further.

In 2017, Inalum will further expand to the upstream sector by constructing an alumina refinery in cooperation with other companies.

In the next two years, Inalum will diversify products from ingot to billet, alloy, and burned-anode.

Editing by Johannes Simbolon