India’s Ministry of Steel has advised state-run steel mill SAIL to divest and monetize all non-core business verticals and emerge as a “pure-play” steel producer, a government official said on Monday, September 21.
The steel company has also been asked to exit from investments in all joint ventures and steel processing units, the official said.
The advice to exit non-steelmaking investments comes in the wake of SAIL posting a $166 million loss for the first quarter of fiscal year 2020-21, he added.
The monetization of all non-steel business verticals, idle assets and decommissioned facilities, would enable SAIL to pull out of the red, the official said.
SAIL has four subsidiaries, one associate company and 24 joint ventures in non-steel businesses such as power generation, rail wagon manufacturing and slag cement production, and has a stake in International Coal Ventures Limited (ICVL) for sourcing coking coal from overseas with cumulative investments of around $205 million in equities in these ventures.