In Berlin on Friday, 23 October 2026, Union Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal sat down with Murat Akyildiz, Global General Partner at the Knauf Group, to explore how one of Germany's most prominent building-materials giants can deepen its manufacturing footprint in India — a conversation that sits squarely at the intersection of sustainable construction and the country's breakneck urbanisation story.

What Goyal and Akyildiz Put on the Table

The minister described the meeting as covering Knauf's expanding manufacturing presence in India and 'avenues to deepen collaboration across sustainable construction materials and infrastructure development, aligning with India's unprecedented urban and economic transformation.' The language is deliberate: sustainable construction materials — think gypsum boards, insulation, and dry-wall systems — are precisely the product lines where Knauf Group has built its global reputation over decades.

Knauf, headquartered in Iphofen, Germany, already operates plants in India and has long positioned the country as a high-priority growth market. The Berlin talks signal that both sides see room to move faster.

Why Germany, Why Now

Germany is one of India's most consequential European economic partners, and Goyal's Berlin stop is part of a wider diplomatic push to pull European manufacturing investment eastward. The backdrop is hard to ignore: India's National Infrastructure Pipeline, announced in 2019, targets a staggering ₹111 lakh crore in urban and transport infrastructure spending — a pipeline that creates enormous demand for exactly the kind of prefabricated, low-carbon building solutions that firms like Knauf specialise in.

At the same time, global supply-chain diversification is pushing multinational manufacturers to look beyond single-country dependencies. India's combination of scale, a growing middle-class housing market, and policy incentives under the Make in India initiative — active since 2014 — makes it a natural landing pad.

The Bigger FDI Picture

Goyal's meeting is one data point in a broader pattern: European firms in specialised materials, clean technology, and precision manufacturing are steadily building local capacity in India rather than exporting finished products. For New Delhi, that shift matters — it means jobs, technology transfer, and reduced import dependence in sectors that feed directly into housing and infrastructure targets.

One number frames the stakes: India needs to house hundreds of millions of new urban residents over the next two decades. Closing that gap with conventional brick-and-mortar at scale is neither fast enough nor green enough. That is precisely the market opportunity Knauf — and Indian policymakers — are eyeing.

With the EU-India trade and investment agreement still under negotiation, any concrete Knauf expansion announcement — a new plant, a technology-transfer deal — would add visible momentum to the bilateral economic relationship at a moment both sides are eager to show progress.