02/02/2007

The LPC Group, the UK’s largest independent manufacturer of tissue-based hygiene products, has further expanded its operations with the purchase of the Roanne paper mill in the South of France.

The mill, built in the late 1980s by market competitor SCA, was on the verge of closure until LPC stepped in to acquire it in a multi-million pound deal. The Leicester-based paper maker will use the mill to supplement the Group’s Swedish Tissue plant, which produces specialised paper in Kisa, Sweden. The existing Swedish management team will control the Roanne facility.

This will give the Group an immediate manufacturing capacity of 85,000 tonnes, which will make it the biggest supplier of this type of product in the world. LPC plans to expand the two sites in Kisa and Roanne, installing the most technologically advanced machinery available to boost total output to 140,000 tonnes p.a. and make LPC the clear global market leader in this sector. The specialised tissue made at the sites will be sold to customers ranging from small converters to the world's biggest names in consumer products.

The acquisition is just the latest step in LPC's recent rapid expansion, following closely behind the completion of the Group's new 425,000 square foot manufacturing plant at Rothley Lodge in North Leicestershire. This site, along with the plant in Hamilton, Leicester, manufactures and converts paper into consumer products such as toilet rolls, kitchen towels and facial tissues. Much of the output is sold directly to the UK's major multiple retailers as 'own-label' alternatives to branded goods, and LPC prides itself on producing items that are more than a match for any competition in terms of both quality and price.

LPC will continue to develop both in Leicestershire and on the Continent in Germany and Spain. An additional paper making machine rated at 60,000 tonnes p.a. is currently being ordered for the UK operation. Permission and grants have already been approved on sites in Germany and Spain where it is planned to have green-field production sites by 2010. Capacity and subsequently revenue will more than double in the next three years.

About Amin Tejani
Amin Tejani is the Executive Chairman of the LPC Group, Britain's largest independent manufacturer of specialist paper products, which has its headquarters in Leicester. Amin's family were among more than 50,000 of Uganda's Asian residents forcibly expelled from Uganda in 1972. The family rebuilt their life in Leicestershire, starting with a small retail outlet in Loughborough before creating and operating one of the most successful businesses in the paper industry.
About LPC Group
The LPC Group PLC is the UK's largest independent tissue products manufacturer with a focus on the fast growing private label market and with operations in the UK and Sweden. LPC manufactures both consumer (“At Home”) tissue products sold to the major international retail groups and institutional (“Away from Home”) tissue products sold directly to business users or via wholesalers.

LPC's sales have grown at a rate of 20% per annum over the last 3 years. Current annual sales are approximately £200 million. The Group's manufacturing plants are in the UK (primarily the Leicester area), in Sweden and in France (where LPC manufactures a range of specialty tissue products sold all over the world).

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