The Tinplate Company of India Limited (TCIL), a subsidiary of Tata Steel will complete 100 glorious years of its existence on January 20, 2020 following the ideals and philosophy laid down by Tata groupRs s founder, JN Tata.
The journey of TCIL began in 1920. Started as joint venture between TISCO (now Tata Steel) and BOCL (a British company – Burmah Oil Company Ltd.), the Company rolled out the first tinplate in December 1922 from its facility in Jamshedpur, Jharkhand (erstwhile Bihar).
TCIL is a manufacturer of Tinplate, an environment-friendly packaging material. The steel base with coating of Tin suffice the need of packaging, i.e. strength and food compatibility. Worldwide two-thirds of tinplate produced goes into food packaging. Process improvement, Innovation and continual improvement has helped the company to sustain a market share of about 45% in India with 18-20% of its production being exported.
The technology with which production started primarily involved Hot Pack Rolling of steel sheet bars followed by tinning by Hot Dip technology. In 1950s, the product was highly profitable with more than 100% value addition over basic raw material. Designed to produce 28,000 tonnes of tinplate, the facility went on to produce 60,000 tonnes, through sheer dedication and hardwork of the employees. The 1950s also saw the advent of efficient process to produce tinplate, using the electrolysis process.
To be aligned with market needs, the company set up its 1st Electrolytic Tinning Line (ETL) in 1979. Since its indigenous raw material (TMBP – Tin Mill Black Plate) sourcing plan did not work out, company was left with no choice but to import the same.
High duties of import, erratic supply conditions and quality issues due to high lead time of supply could not support the new technology and lead to ineffective operations of the new tinning line.
During late 70s, BOCL, due to its financial difficulties wanted to sell off its equity holdings. During the same time TISCO stopped production of steel bars (raw material for the hot dip facilities) due to strategic reasons leading to loss of production. The new tinning line could not sustain the vagaries of imported raw material due to high cost and fluctuation in supplies. All put together, the company carried a negative worth at the end of 1980.
In 1981, TISCO got the preferential rights to purchase BOCL’s shares and, subsequent multiple initiatives saw the company moving ahead from mid 80s.Key strategic decision was taken during this period, backward integration of TCIL (Cold Colling Mill Complex - CRM) to set up its own TMBP making facility (raw material for tinning line) and reinforcement of TISCO’s flat products business by setting up the Hot Strip Mill (HSM) at Jamshedpur which would provide raw material to TCIL’s CRM complex. This brought in a lot of excitement in the organisation. However, the dark side of the moon was taking the inevitable decision of closure of the old facilities, due to obsolescence of technology and non-availability of raw material.
The late 90s saw coming up of the state of art CRM complex and phasing out of the old hot dip technology and plant.
Standing today, the company has a capacity to produce 379,000 tonnes per annum of tinplate and the journey continues with options being explored for further capacity addition at Jamshedpur.
While the turf has changed and challenges are many, the team is committed to uphold the foundation laid in its journey towards a sustainable future. TCIL is working for the next level of organic growth of tinplate production and further reinforcement of downstream presence.
