A study of top four petrochemical companies (Reliance, Nocil, Gail, Petronet Lng) on the basis of return on investment

Till the early nineties, the petrochemical industry was state-controlled and dominated by the state-owned IPCL. The only other integrated player, that too in the private sector, was NOCIL with a very small capacity. Most other players had small, uneconomic size plants, which were operated on molasses and alcohol. With the liberalisation process in the nineties, the gates of the petrochemical sector were opened out to private enterprises for building up new capacities. In the private sector, Reliance Industries was quick enough to take advantage. It started expanding and building up existing and new capacities in a mega way. In the post-liberalisation era, Reliance Industries and IPCL have started building up world-size, fully-integrated plants. The Indian petrochemical industry, at present, is highly concentrated. There are only few players: Reliance Industries, Nocil and Petronet LNG and Gail are few of them. All the companies have fully-integrated plants. The present paper aims to analyse the return on investment of these four petrochemical Companies