Alkali Metals Limited was incorporated on April 17, 1968 as Alkali Metals Private Limited in Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh. The company was converted into a public limited company and called Alkali Metals Ltd on 6 November, 2008. Dr. Y.V.S. Murty has promoted the company. Presently, it is engaged in manufacture and sale of chemicals.
Originally set up for manufacturing of Sodium Metal, the Company subsequently diversified into manufacturing of Sodium derivatives, Pyridine derivatives, Fine Chemicals and API's etc. The Company is recognised as an 'Export House' by DGFT and also recognised by Dept. of Science and Technology, New Delhi as an approved 'In house R & D Facility'. The Company operate 3 manufacturing units, at Uppal, Dommara Pochampally and JNPC Visakhapatnam.
The Company has started as a joint venture with APIDC. The company has commenced the production of sodium metal, with an installed capacity of 125 MT. In the year 1986, APIDC exited from the joint venture. With increasing power tariffs, imported sodium metal became more attractive compared to the cost of indigenous production. Hence, company has begun to diversify and built its product portfolio, classified into: Sodium derivatives, Pyridine derivatives and Fine chemicals. These products find wide application and use in various industries like the pharma, agro based products, pesticides, explosives, biotechnology products, electroplating chemicals etc. Currently, the Company has two manufacturing facilities, Unit I and II, both ISO 14001:2004 and ISO 9001:2000 certified, and both units are having installed capacity of 2,200 MTPA. Unit II, for which the land and building was taken on lease from Balaji Agro Industries Limited (a group company), commenced active operations in the year 2003, as a 100% EOU. Subsequently in the year 2005, the Company acquired the complete ownership of the Unit. In the same year, the company also set up a separate plant in Unit I for recovery of hydrogen which could be re - deployed in the manufacturing process, thus enabling energy conservation.
Balaji Agro Industries Limited was acquired by Alkali Metals Limited to foray into processing of agro based products, for which Alkali Metals started acquiring shares of Balaji Agro Industries Limited, from its erstwhile promoters from July 1, 2000. The registered office was shifted to Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh and it was converted into a public limited company. It also became a subsidiary of Alkali Metals with effect from April 2, 2002 and the erstwhile promoters exited the Company fully on March 29, 2003. They are no longer the shareholders of Balaji Agro Industries Limited, However, later it was found that integrating the business processes of Alkali Metals Limited, and Balaji Agro Indistries Limited, was not feasible and therefore Alkali Metals Limited, divested its stake in Balaji Agro Industries Limited, to Dr. Y. V. S. Murty, Mrs. Y. V. Lalitha Devi, Mr. Y. S. R. Venkata Rao and Mrs. Y. Krishna Veni on March 19, 2005. Since then, Balaji Agro Industries Limited has ceased to be a subsidiary of Alkali Metals Limited.
During 2007-08, the Company completed the Expansion project in 100% EOU to enhance the production capacity with an investment of Rs 9.50 crores. As a result, the aggregate installed capacity of the company increased from 3450 MT to 4400 MT. It finalized plans of starting Production Plant at Pharma City, Visakhapatnam involving capital outlay of Rs 42.72 Crores.