Marble quarries owner Fox Marble Holdings PLC (LON:FOX) announced it has processed its first block of Illyric White marble at its processing factory in Kosovo.
The processing of marble in Kosovo is an historic first, as Fox Marble's factory is the first marble processing plant in the country.
Up until the long-awaited opening of the factory, Fox Marble had been shipping its slabs off to Italy to be processed.
The new factory is equipped with Italian machinery comprising Barsanti gang-saws, a Gaspari Menotti polishing line and a Promotec-designed resin line.
It will have the capacity to produce up to 400,000 square metres per annum of cut and polished slabs once the factory is in full production.
Speaking to Proactive Investors earlier this week, Fox Marble’s chief executive Chris Gilbert said the ability to cut and polish its own blocks would bring several benefits.
“First, we’ll be able to claw back margin,” Gilbert said.
“It also gives us lots of flexibility in terms of the supply chain,” he added.
“It also increases yield. We can now process smaller bits of marble that it was not economical to ship, so yields per tonne will rise – not that we’re short of marble,” Gilbert said.
The factory currently has two gang-saws installed that are designed to cut and trim large blocks of marble up to 24 tonnes (typically between 12 and 20 tonnes) that are then cut into slabs (usually 2-3cm in thickness).
A third gang-saw, which will optmimise factory efficiencies, will be installed in 2017, Fox Marble said.
The slabs, after cutting, could then be processed if required through the installed resin line and then through the polishing line, which is in the process of final installation, to produce a finished polished marble product.
"The opening of the factory and commencement of marble processing is a major milestone on the path towards Fox Marble offering a fully integrated marble production to sales service to its customers,” Gilbert told investors.
“This is particularly relevant for the domestic Balkans market where customers have already paid contract deposits to ensure supply once the construction season starts again in Q2 2017,” he added.
Fox Marble’s shares rose 0.6% to 7.92p on the news.