On June 19, Osaka Gas Liquid announced that it would be making a capital investment in an industrial gas manufacturer of Singapore to participate in the Vietnamese industrial gas production and sales business. Concretely, through the capital investment in SQC Investment Pte. Ltd. (SQC), an investor under the Sing Swee Bee Group headquartered in Singapore which is engaged in the industrial gas and LNG business in Southeast Asian countries, Osaka Gas Liquid supports its 100%-owned Sing Industrial Gas Vietnam Company Limited (SIGVN) in sales activities to local Japanese companies and also provides sales promotion aid and technical assistance including the know-how on the safety handling of an air-separation plant.

In the midst of the shrinking Japanese industrial gas market on a medium/long-term basis, OGL seeks an essence to further growth in overseas market. The idea of the advancement to Vietnam is positioned to be a part of clues for that aim.

SIGVN to which OGL invested has business areas in Vietnam and Cambodia is selling about JPY700 million as per the latest account FY2019 ending December. The company has about 100 employees with its head office located in Binh Duong Province, around which there is an industrial complex where about 200 Japanese companies are in operation now.

In the premises of the headquarters there is an air-separation plant (O2/N2 output capacity: 60 tons/day) of which operation rate is said to have reached 100% at the end of 2019 thanks to the increases in the demand.

In addition, the company produces acetylene (50 tons/year) and is provided with CE tanks of Argon and CO2. It also possesses five tank-trucks and trailers.

As the SSB Group of parent company possesses a lot of ISO containers, the company is planning to look into an international transportation of industrial gases. Taking the opportunity of OGL’s investment, SIGVN estimates its sales in 2025 up to JPY1.5 billion which is 114% of that in 2019. The SSB Group of SIGVN’s parent company is a conglomerate which has business bases in 8 countries including Malaysia, Vietnam, China, Thailand, India, the Philippines and Indonesia.

In the industrial gas business, the SSB Group keeps an eye especially on Vietnam which is growing remarkably, its consolidated turnover marked JPY2.5 billion for FY2019 ending December.
The clue of OGL’s capital investment to the SSB Group dates back to about two years ago. Osaka Gas of OGL’s parent company approached the SSB Group seeking possibilities of discussion for collaboration in the LNG business. When OGL proposed to collaborate in the industrial gas business, the discussion turned out into a topic of joint investment to SIGVN.

As for OGL’s investment, OGL adopted a method to obtain 25% by a third-party allocation of the shares issued by SQC of SSB Group’s investor. Any detail of the invested amount has not been disclosed.

The Osaka Gas Group deems the Southeast Asia to be an important area for business activities expecting a growing demand for natural gas, and is aiming for various types of business collaborations in connection with LNG other than industrial gases.