HONG KONG (Yonhap) -- CJ Cheiljedang Corp., Korea's leading food manufacturer, aims to increase its sales in China by more than 50 percent this year, boosted by its newly established factory there, company officials said Thursday.
The South Korean firm's Chinese sales will likely top 500 billion won ($448 million) this year, up nearly 50 percent from some 330 billion, they said.
CJ Cheiljedang has recently completed a plant in Shenyang, located in northeast China, with an initial capital of $400 million.
The Shenyang factory is expected to sharply increase CJ Cheiljedang's production capacity in China, helping the Korean company reduce costs and expand its presence in the world's most populous market.
The plant has an annual capacity of 100,000 tons of lysine, 50,000 tons of threonine and 3,000 tons of nucleic acid, a seasoning material, the CJ officials said.
CJ CheilJedng's overall production capacity in China will reach 200,000 tons of lysine, 50,000 tons of threonine and 13,000 tons of nucleic acid, the company officials said.
The company expects to see its sales in China surpass 700 billion won in 2013.
Meanwhile, CJ CheilJedang hopes it will capture the top status in the global lysine market. CJ CheilJedang said it will secure an annual capacity of 700,000 tons of lysine and a global market share of 30 percent by 2014.
The global lysine market stands at $3 billion with China's GBT having the largest market share. Japan's Ajinomoto and CJ CheilJedang share the No. 2 spot, followed by ADM of the U.S. (Yonhap)