Furukawa Electric to Launch Optical Fiber JV in India

Furukawa Electric announced on Friday the firm establishes a joint venture company in India to make optical fiber. The firm agreed with Indian electric wire maker, Universal Cable for the joint venture on 11 April. They will start the operation in Goa in September 2009 and sell 3-4 billion yen per year in and after 2010.

Universal Cable controls 55% of the JV with 45% share by Furukawa Electric. The JV uses Universal Cable’s existing plant in Goa to convert for higher valued products operation.

Furukawa Electric has provided technical support of power cables to Universal Cable for years. Furukawa Electric tries to follow the growing Indian demand for optical fiber through the JV while Universal Cable tries to improve the competitiveness by introducing technology of Furukawa Electric.

Furukawa Electric supplies glass materials for the fiber from Mie plant in Japan. The firm adds the optical fiber production plant to existing plants in Japan, USA, Denmark, Brazil and China.

Indian optical fiber market is estimated to be 9 million kilometers of fiber core in 2008, which represents around 6% of the world demand. The market in India is expected to grow to 1.7 times in 5 years.