Nongshim Co., South Korea’s leading instant noodle maker, said Monday that it will expand its instant noodle plant in Los Angeles to meet growing demand there.

The expansion will increase the plant’s daily production capacity to 1.5 million units and its annual production capacity to 550 million units from the current 440 million, the company said.

The expansion, to be completed at the end of this month, will likely raise sales of Nongshim America Inc., Nongshim’s U.S. subsidiary, to $200 million this year, up 44 percent from $140 million in 2012, Nonghshim said.

A rise in sales of “Shinramyeon Black,” one of its flagship instant noodle Shinramyeon brands, is attributable to the expansion, the first since 2005 when the U.S. plant was built, the company said.

Sales of Shinramyeon Black came to $15 million in the U.S. market last year, or 60 percent of Nongshim’s overseas sales, helped by an advertisement for the product featuring South Korean singer Psy, the company said. Psy’s song “Gangam Style” was a worldwide mega hit last year.

Nongshim also said it will step up efforts to retain its second rank in the U.S. ramyeon market with the development of products to suit American tastes and a high-price strategy to raise its brand image. Currently, Japanese ramyeon makers dominate the American market with a combined 80 percent share. (Yonhap News)