Şişecam Grows in Export Markets with New Investments

A global player in glass and chemicals with production operations across 14 countries on four continents and sales in over 150 countries, Şişecam continues to accelerate investments in line with its vision to become one of the top three players in its core business areas. The only global company operating in all major segments of glass, Şişecam has decided to establish a two-furnace glass packaging facility in Hungary with an investment of EUR 255 million, including working capital requirements, to strengthen its game-changing position in the global glass league. At the same time, to support the growth of locomotive sectors in Turkey where it is an input provider, Şişecam is also planning to invest in two float lines. By the end of 2024, it aims to increase Turkey's flat glass production capacity by 25 percent to over 2.5 million tonnes. Prof. Dr. Ahmet Kırman, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Şişecam, stated that Şişecam is pursuing its strong global objectives through new investment moves focused on sustainable value creation across different business areas, saying: "We started our journey with the mission of establishing the Turkish glass industry in 1935, and today we continue that journey as a global player in glass and chemicals. As always, even in the uncertain environment created by the global pandemic, we are implementing significant investments that will create value for our company and our entire ecosystem. To meet the rising flat glass demand in our country and support the development of the sectors we supply, we are planning to make investments in two new float lines and increase our flat glass production capacity from the current 2 million tonnes to 2.5 million tonnes through capacity increases via cold repairs on our existing lines and new line investments. We will also implement our first glass packaging production facility investment in Europe in Hungary. In this way, while expanding our footprint in the European glass packaging market, we will make a significant contribution to strengthening our country's presence in global glass trade." Flat glass, glass home products, glass packaging and glass fiber, as well as business lines encompassing soda and chromium compounds, Şişecam, a global player, is pressing ahead with new investments to strengthen its game-changing position in the global glass league. To respond to growing glass packaging demand in Europe, Şişecam will make a new facility investment in Hungary and support the growth of locomotive sectors to which it provides input in Turkey by increasing its flat glass production capacity from 2 million tonnes through investments in two new float lines and improvement work on existing lines to 2.5 million tonnes. While implementing these new line investments, Şişecam will also develop its existing lines through cold repairs, in line with new technologies and new design trends, thereby increasing both product diversity, efficiency and line capacities. Prof. Dr. Ahmet Kırman, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Şişecam, in his statement regarding the investments, noted that Şişecam, which continues its investments with the goal of becoming one of the world's three largest producers in its core business areas, is one of the leading players shaping the world glass industry in business lines encompassing all major segments of glass such as "flat glass", "glass home products", "glass packaging", "glass fiber" and "automotive glass" as well as "soda" and "chromium compounds". Prof. Dr. Kırman continued his statement as follows: "With our soda investment initiative in the US in the near term, we are now operating in 22 countries across 14 countries on four continents with 22,000 employees, and bringing our innovative products to customers in over 150 countries. We are the second largest producer of glass home products in the world, and the fifth largest in glass packaging and flat glass. In addition, we are the world's eighth largest soda producer and a global leader in chromium chemicals."

"Expanding Our Footprint in the European Glass Packaging Market"

Prof. Dr. Ahmet Kırman, noting that Şişecam conducts its glass packaging operations with a total of 10 production facilities in 4 countries and annual production capacity of 2.6 million tonnes, provided the following information about the glass packaging facility investment it will undertake in Hungary: "The European market, with a volume of 20 million tonnes representing one-quarter of the global glass packaging market, offers important opportunities for the rapid development of the sector and the comprehensive development of our company's existing production footprint. When we set out to capitalize on the opportunities in Europe, we made a decision to invest in a new facility in Hungary. We aim for the first furnace of this first glass packaging facility investment in Europe to begin operations in 2023 and for the facility to reach full capacity by 2025. When completed, our production facility will have a net production capacity of 330,000 tonnes and will meet glass packaging demand in both Hungary and a wide geography in Europe. In this way, while expanding our footprint in the European glass packaging market, we will make a significant contribution to strengthening our country's presence in global glass trade."

"We Will Increase Our Flat Glass Production Capacity to 2.5 Million Tonnes"

Prof. Dr. Ahmet Kırman, stating that Şişecam will continue to create value for Turkey with new investments in the flat glass field where it is Europe's production capacity leader, said: "In the uncertain environment created by the global pandemic, despite extraordinary circumstances, we continued our investments without interruption within the scope of our priority to meet our country's glass demand and create value for our country's economy. Following the Polatlı facility, which we made Europe's largest flat glass hub with our eighth furnace that came into operation in October 2020, we started up our sixth furnace at our Yenişehir flat glass facility after completing its cold repair. We will also start up our fifth furnace at our Yenişehir facility, which has a capacity of 240,000 tonnes and for which we are continuing the cold repair, in the last quarter of the year. With our Polatlı investment, our furnace count in Turkey has risen to eight, and our flat glass production capacity in Turkey has exceeded 2 million tonnes." Expressing that Şişecam will continue its investments at full pace that will strengthen the position of the Turkish glass sector globally to meet the market's rising demand, ensure sustainable exports, and support the growth of its customers and the sectors it supplies, Prof. Dr. Ahmet Kırman continued his statement as follows: "The architectural glass business area, which represents 30 percent of our sales revenue and 35 percent of our operating profit, has become one of our main business areas where we have strengthened our operations with new capacities we have put into operation to date, our intensive R&D activities and new value-added products we have brought to the market, and where we have developed the market with its entire ecosystem. Through improvement work and new investments on our existing lines, we aim to increase our flat glass production capacity to 2.5 million tonnes by the end of 2024. For this, we are planning to launch a new high-capacity float line dedicated to architectural glass this year. In addition to this new float line, which we plan to complete in 2023, another step we are taking to increase our flat glass capacity is to carry out the cold repair of our TR1 float line at our Kırklareli production facility while increasing its capacity. In 2024, we plan to completely renovate this line and increase its capacity by over 40 percent. With this investment, our TR1 line will be among the highest capacity lines along with the newly built float line. The capabilities brought by our wide footprint in global markets, our production and technology experience strongly support our growth steps. With these capabilities, we will also rapidly implement our investments, quickly responding to rising demand on one hand, and supporting our sector's export potential with new and value-added products on the other."

"We Will Make a New Float Line Investment for Automotive Glass Production"

Prof. Dr. Ahmet Kırman, noting that another strategic investment decision for Şişecam is in the automotive glass field, stated: "Until now, to meet the raw glass requirements of our automotive glass operations, we have been drawing support from our flat glass lines. However, the scale we have now reached in automotive glass production has reached levels where we could dedicate a single float line to automotive raw glass. For this reason, we are planning to establish a new automotive glass float line in our country and to redirect all our float facilities that currently produce automotive raw glass to architectural glass. The design of our new automotive float will be equipped with Industry 4.0 solutions that operate with high efficiency. Through this new automotive raw glass float line investment, we will be able to completely redirect our TR1 line to architectural glass while increasing its capacity through cold repair. In this way, we will realize a one-float-line capacity increase in the flat glass field, and we will also create additional capacities through the optimization of our lines. The establishment of a float line dedicated to automotive raw glass will provide a significant efficiency increase in our automotive glass operations. Having a float line with technical production infrastructure dedicated to automotive glass, the automotive glass business will directly support the growth of our automotive glass operations and our export initiatives for automotive replacement glass."