Aditya Birla Group-owned Grasim Industries, the only producer of the Viscose staple fibre (VSF) in the country, has earmarked more than Rs 3,500 crore on expanding the output of VSF that finds key use in making textiles.

Sushil Agarwal, group CFO of Grasim Industries said that the money will be spent over the next two and a half years. They have a strong balance sheet.

Dilip Gaur, managing director of Grasim Industries said that the board has approved a brownfield expansion of Rs 3,523 crore at the Vilayat facility which will get commissioned by 2021. Coupled with the existing expansion and debottleneck plan of Rs 802 crore, the total capacity for VSF will be increased by 58% to 788 KTPA from the current 498 KTPA.

The company already has expansion projects worth Rs 2,900 crore in process for both its VSF and chemicals businesses, taking the total spend on expanding capacities to more than Rs 6,400 crore.