KT&G's new Pasuruan plant puts more than half its planned overseas cigarette capacity in Indonesia

Measured against the rest of KT&G's plants, Indonesia's 35 billion cigarettes a year are about 54% of the 65 billion the company expects its four overseas plants to reach ^[18]. The older plant in Surabaya, at 14 billion ^[2][3], is now the smaller of the two. With Pasuruan's nine lines ^[4], Indonesia's capacity is 2.5 times what it was ^[20], and the country alone can make 62.5% as many cigarettes as KT&G's three plants in Korea ^[21].

Put the overseas and Korean figures together and KT&G would have 121 billion cigarettes of annual capacity, about 54% of it abroad ^[19]. The company aims to make more than 60% of its output overseas by 2028 ^[15]. Even with all four overseas plants at their full 65 billion, that share holds only if Korean output stays below about 43.3 billion cigarettes ^[12]. That is roughly 77% of the 56 billion the Korean plants can make ^[13].

The reports do not give Korean sales volumes, utilization at any plant, revenue per cigarette or what Pasuruan cost. A shrinking home market would explain the target, but the sources do not report one, so it remains an inference.

Suppose Indonesia fills up on exports to Taiwan, Mongolia, Nigeria and India ^[5] while Korea runs near full. Then the overseas share stalls near 54% ^[19]. Korean volume could instead fall, lifting the share by subtraction. A third case is that the 56 billion Korean figure ^[7] already includes idle lines, and then the target asks little new of those plants. I think the 2028 goal is a statement about Korea, or rather about the roughly 13 billion cigarettes a year of Korean capacity that has to sit unused or close if the plan works ^[16]. The idle-lines case is the counter-thesis, and only a utilization figure would settle it. Suppose KT&G reports more than 60% overseas while its Korean plants make more than 43 billion cigarettes. In that case its overseas count includes volume from outside these four plants, and this reading is wrong ^[12].

KT&G wants 10 trillion won of sales in 2027, up from 6.58 trillion won in 2025 ^[9]. The gap is about 3.42 trillion won, a 52% increase in two years ^[22]. It also wants half of 2027 sales to come from abroad ^[8]. On that target, half is 5 trillion won ^[23].

"With the new plant in Indonesia as the last step, KT&G has completed its large-scale overseas facility investment and built a 'global five-point production system' that will serve as a solid foundation for its global business and future growth," President Bang Kyung-man said ^[17]. For cash flow, the key word is "completed". The businesses KT&G said it will strengthen are heat-not-burn products and health functional food ^[11]. Conventional cigarettes still bring in about 90% of sales, and heat-not-burn the other 10% ^[10].