The China Building Materials Group was officially established on Friday following the merger of two state-owned enterprises (SOEs) under the direction of the state assets watchdog.

With total assets of 550 billion yuan (82.7 billion U.S. dollars), the new company is China's largest building materials SOE and is regulated by the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC).

The new company resulted from the merger of China National Building Materials Group Corporation (CNBM) and China National Materials Group Corporation Ltd. (SINOMA) after SASAC announced a reorganization plan on Monday.

The company is the world's biggest in production capacity for commercial concrete, gypsum board, glass fiber, wind turbine blades, and other materials.

China has started accelerating reorganization of its SOEs to improve their competitiveness. A merger of two tourism companies was announced in early August.

There are currently more than 100 SOEs directly regulated by the central government, while many more are under the administration of local authorities.

Source : XINHUA