Indian Metal Industry Outlook, FY 2019

Indian metal market growth in 2019 witnessed global, macroeconomic and industrial factors, such as trade wars, an increase in industry consolidation, plant closures, and restricted imports. The industry’s main objective remained cost optimization, raw material sustainability, and process efficiency. The Indian Government’s flagship programs—Make in India, National Capital Goods Policy, Development of 100 Smart Cities, Power For All—are all set to improve metal consumption within the next five years. To achieve targeted domestic steel capacity of 300 MTPA by 2030, India needs to invest $156.08 billion during the 2030–2031 time period. Industry consolidation is anticipated to support this objective. Strategic alliances, such as SAIL-Arcelor Mittal and RINL-PGCIL, are redefining the domestic landscape, reducing distressed assets, and improving the health of the industry. In line with the global trend, Industry 4.0 is creating a huge influence on regulating the way operations take place in the industry. In line with lightweighting, Aluminium is anticipated to play a vital role in the automotive industry from 2020 and beyond. Electric Vehicles are expected to witness growth in the coming years as government incentives increase. The current slowdown in the industry is likely to impact EV sales growth in 2020. Raw material availability and cost sustenance can be addressed through scrap usage. Global factors, such as the trade war between US and China, have resulted in increased availability in the rest of the world, especially Asia. Indian imports have witnessed increased uptake of non-ferrous scrap in 2019. The Steel Scrap Recycling Policy (SSRP), drafted and circulated in July 2019, is intended to facilitate and provide a framework for the functioning of metal scrap centers. It has been considered as a preliminary step to formalizing the largely unorganized scrap market. India is taking steps to meet the requirements of the circular economy and raw material sustenance is a vital factor to achieve this objective. This is anticipated to optimize the scrap value chain and enable organized global scrap trade flow. Capacity expansion plans were announced in 2019 and are expected to be commissioned in 2022 and 2024 time period. Market highlights of 2019, demand, growth rates and capacity expansions for steel, aluminium, and copper have been analyzed. Our perspective on the various market trends and their driving factors in 2020 has been presented. The Go-To market strategy and technology trends expected to define the Indian metal industry in 2020 are elaborated in this research service.