Sandur Manganese & Iron Ores Ltd (SMIORE) is fundamentally a miner that has spent seven decades turning what it pulls from the ground into progressively more valuable products - first ore, then ferroalloys, then its own power and coke, and most recently specialty steel for carmakers. It began in 1954 when a family took over a Belgian mining lease in the hills of Sandur, Karnataka, determined to run the mines scientifically rather than strip them and leave. The recurring approach is vertical integration: each new stage was built to consume the output of the stage before it, so the company captures margin at every step from mine to finished steel component.
Business segments
Four engines at different stages of maturity - a mining cash cow, a ferroalloys and captive-energy complex that feeds on it, and a recently acquired specialty-steel platform that turns both into auto-grade products - each built with the cash flows of the one before.
1. Mining: the ore body that funds everything else
Two mining leases in Karnataka hold 15 million tonnes of manganese and 138 million tonnes of iron ore, producing at low cost with permits valid until 2033 - this is the group’s original and still-central cash engine.
- Low-phosphorus manganese is the hidden advantage - SMIORE’s manganese ore carries phosphorus below 0.05%, which makes it one of the finest blending materials for ferroalloy and steel makers, so it commands premium demand even though the ore is low-grade.
- Iron ore is sold, not just dug - the company can produce up to 4.36 MTPA of iron ore after a series of regulatory approvals that lifted the ceiling from 1.6 MTPA, and it has separate permission to sell an additional 0.327 million tonnes of already-excavated incidental ore.
- A pipe conveyor replaces trucks - a 1.2 km downhill pipe conveyor system is being built to carry ore straight from the Kammathuru mine to the railway siding, which cuts evacuation cost and dust while complying with Supreme Court directives on mechanised transport.
- The mines are rated among India’s best - the operation has received a 5-Star rating every year since the government’s Sustainable Development Framework began, and in 2023-24 it earned the 7-Star recognition, ranking first in the industry.
2. Ferroalloys and captive energy: turning ore into alloys with self-made power
A 95,000-tonne silicomanganese and ferromanganese plant runs on electricity generated as a by-product of its own coke ovens and renewable-energy joint ventures - so power, the biggest cost in making ferroalloys, is largely internalised.
- Power is a by-product, not a bill - the coke oven plant produces coke for sale, but the waste heat from its four batteries is captured by two boilers to generate 32 MW of electricity, which then feeds the ferroalloy furnaces at a fraction of grid power cost.
- Captive ore meets captive furnaces - about 85% of the manganese ore used in the ferroalloy plant comes from SMIORE’s own mines, so the furnaces are insulated from open-market ore prices and supply swings.
- Renewable energy fills the gap - two joint-venture projects add another 63 MW of solar and wind-hybrid capacity, further reducing reliance on coal-based grid power and lowering the effective cost of production.
- Waste is fed back into the process - ferromanganese slag is recycled into bricks and charged back into the silicomanganese furnaces to recover trapped manganese, while a vendor set up on site turns silicomanganese slag into M-sand for construction.
3. Coke: a conversion business that hedges coal-price risk
A 0.5 MTPA coke oven plant sells coke to industrial buyers, but nearly half its capacity now runs under a fixed-fee conversion agreement - so the customer bears the coal-price swing and SMIORE earns a processing margin.
- Conversion contracts remove commodity risk - roughly 46% of annual coke capacity is secured under a conversion agreement with a large customer effective April 2025, meaning SMIORE is paid to process imported coking coal rather than gambling on the resale price of coke.
- Imported coal is the only raw-material exposure - 100% of coking coal is imported, so the segment’s primary focus is managing inventory losses when seaborne coal prices move sharply.
4. Specialty steel: the auto-grade downstream bet
Acquired in November 2024, Arjas Steel makes Special Bar Quality steel for the engines, gears and axles of passenger cars, trucks and two-wheelers - an empanelled supplier to almost every major auto OEM in India, with barriers to entry that commodity steel cannot match.
- Over 100 grades for auto and beyond - Arjas produces more than 100 steel grades across two plants (Tadipatri, Andhra Pradesh and Mandi Gobindgarh, Punjab), using both blast-furnace and electric-arc-furnace routes, and it is expanding into railways, defence and aerospace grades.
- Empanelment is the moat - auto OEMs run a long, stringent qualification process before approving a steel supplier, and Arjas is already approved by Hyundai, Mahindra, Maruti Suzuki, Daimler, Honda, Royal Enfield and others, which makes switching costly for customers.
- The mines are only 250 km away - both SMIORE’s iron-ore mines and the Tadipatri steel plant have railway sidings, so Arjas can draw raw material directly from the group’s captive ore base, cutting logistics cost and giving it an integrated cost structure that standalone SBQ mills lack.
- Captive power repeats the playbook - Arjas has its own 21 MW waste-heat recovery unit and a 20 MW solar project, mirroring the ferroalloys division’s model of generating cheap electricity as a by-product.
Group structure and partners
The promoter group holds roughly three-quarters of the company, and the structure is built around a single material subsidiary - Arjas Steel - with captive energy housed in joint ventures rather than on the balance sheet.
- Promoter control is concentrated - Skand Private Limited is the holding company, and promoter entities together held 74.22% as of FY25; a November 2025 amalgamation of four promoter-group companies consolidated their shareholding without changing the aggregate stake.
- Arjas Steel is the main subsidiary - SMIORE owns approximately 99% of Arjas Steel, which in turn fully owns Arjas Modern Steel, the Punjab-based electric-arc-furnace operation.
- Energy sits in joint ventures - the 42.9 MW solar-wind hybrid project is held through Renew Sandur Green Energy (SMIORE owns 49% with board representation and a right of first refusal on share transfers), and the 20.4 MW Arjas solar project is held through a separate SPV.
- A pellet subsidiary was wound up - Sandur Pellets Private Limited, incorporated in 2022 for pelletisation and metals trading, never conducted business and was voluntarily liquidated with NCLT approval in April 2026.