Personal Profile
Seasoned professional with 15 years of experience in General Management, Operations, M&A and Business Strategy. Presently, Chief Executive Officer and Executive Director for Cemza (Pty) Ltd (Heidelberg JV cement manufacturing company in South Africa). June 2004 – Bachelor of Mechanical Engineering, Mumbai University (India)May 2008 – MBA Finance (Full time 2-year residential program) from ICFAI Business School, Hyderabad (India)EDUCATION
July 2015 – Executive Education Program in Strategic thinking & implementation from Indian School of Business, Hyderabad (India)SIGNIFICANT ACHIEVEMENTS• Head hunted by Heidelberg to lead its new operations of South Africa. Doubled the production and revenue in less than an year. Youngest Country CEO within the USD 45bn Aditya Birla Group. Successfully lead 2 big ticket acquisitions: USD 2.4bn acquisition of countrywide Jaypee Cement operations - March 2016; USD 700mn acquisition of 2 cement plants in Western India - June 2014 Winner of “Group Chairman’s Distinguished Achiever Award 2014” and “Managing Director’s Pride Award 2016”
Company Profile
Cemza began working on the project to develop a greenfield cement grinding facility in the Eastern Cape in the early part of the 2010 decade. The selection of the location at Coega IDZ in Port Elizabeth, South Africa was influenced mainly by the availability of suitable land, ready infrastructure, and access to the port of Ngqura
Following the site selection, all necessary regulatory approvals and permits were obtained over a period of few years. A reputed contractor was appointed to oversee the construction of facilities. Cement was first produced at the site on 17 November 2018.
The state-of-the-art facilities and choice of energy-efficient technology; along with an operations team having comprehensive cement industry experience, has poised Cemza to offer a well-engineered and a reliable cement option to our customers. The project is strengthened by the partnership with Heidelberg Materials, one of the largest building materials companies globally, which operates in 60 countries on 5 continents with 3000 production sites.
Cemza engineered cement is top grade quality, formulated to ensure long term structural strength and durability. HeidelbergCement is one of the world’s largest building materials companies. The core activities of Heidelberg Cement include the production and distribution of cement and aggregates, the two essential raw materials for concrete. The downstream activities include mainly the production of ready-mixed concrete, and other building products in some countries. With the takeover of Italcementi, Heidelberg Cement became the number 1 in aggregates production, number 2 in cement, and number 3 in ready-mixed concrete globally. With a strong geographical footprint spanning across 60 countries on five continents, a significantly expanded Heidelberg Cement Group, employs 59,000 work force at more than 3,000 production sites.
The part ownership by Heidelberg Cement, a global industry leader, provides Cemza a strong foundation to build its long-term success on sustainable business practices. The partnership with Heidelberg Cement allows access to global best practices on efficient and innovative production processes, the development of new products and the use of alternative raw materials and fuels. In the long run, it will provide Cemza a platform to continually update its processes in line with the emerging global trends as well as serve its customers with quality and well-engineered products. Rahul Godbole is the Chief Executive Officer for Cemza, a Mechanical Engineer with an MBA in Finance. He has diverse experience across business functions and geographies in the cement industry. His last stint with UltraTech Cement spanned over a decade in India and the Middle East. Prior to UltraTech Cement, he worked with JP Morgan Chase. Rahul brings on board strong domain knowledge and global cement industry experience.