Through its international companies and production...
Through its international companies and production centres, Roca is present in five continents. Its sales network is spread throughout 135 countries, it has 76 production plants and it employs around 21.100 workers throughout the world.
Roca began its activities in 1917 as Compañía Roca Radiadores S.A, a company that exclusively made cast iron radiators for domestic heating at its factory in Gavà, near Barcelona. However, the rapid success of new products on the market and its firm desire to expand led it to expand its areas of business with the aim of diversifying its activities. As a result, in 1925 it commenced production of cast iron bathtubs. In 1936, Roca entered the porcelain sanitaryware sector and, in 1954, it began to make faucets. A second porcelain factory was opened in Alcalá de Henares, Madrid, in 1962.
It was in 1963, with the start-up of an air conditioning machine factory in Sabadell, near Barcelona, that Roca became one of the first Spanish enterprises to enter the emerging air conditioning market. Five years later, in 1968, it opened its third porcelain factory, in Alcalá de Guadaira (Seville), whilst 1974 saw the inauguration of its steel bath plant.
The company’s entry into the tile industry took place in the 1980s. The founding of Cerámicas del Foix, which became a subsidiary company, marked the beginning of the current Tiles business. In 1989, the company bought a sanitaryware factory in Portugal.
In line with its growth strategy, the 1980s and 1990s witnessed the opening of sales subsidiaries, the consolidation of agreements with market-leading companies and the securing of takeovers and other business alliances.
In 2002, Roca embarked upon a Group restructuring to organise its different areas of business into independent companies. This restructuring process culminated in 2005 with the sale of its heating and air conditioning businesses to concentrate efforts on the bathroom sector, world leadership in which was achieved in the opening months of 2006.
Roca is an entirely Spanish company whose capital is wholly owned by the family group arising from its founders.