GFG Alliance, the parent company of the international industrial and metals group Liberty House, has announced that Liberty OneSteel Whyalla in Australia has shipped 24,000 mt of slabs to Liberty Steel Newport in South Wales, both being part of Liberty House Group.
According to GFG Alliance, this is the first in a series of deliveries from Liberty’s sister plant at Whyalla, South Australia, and will enable the Newport mill to begin ramping up production of hot rolled coil, as the Welsh site waits for the installation of its own liquid steel and slab-making facilities.
Accordingly, Liberty OneSteel Whyalla will supply the Newport plant with around 100,000 mt of slab in the first year, allowing it to boost output of coil by about a third, to meet growing UK and EU demand for steel from industries such as construction and heavy engineering. The Newport plant will also invest over £10 million in the coming year to upgrade its rolling mill as part of a wider development plan that will eventually include the installation of an electric arc furnace to recycle scrap steel.
Liberty’s Newport plant currently employs around 180 people, producing about 300,000 mt of rolled steel a year. More people will be employed over the next year as output rises to 500,000 mt in the 2019-20 period, en route to a medium-term target of one million mt a year of hot rolled coil.
“This is just the first major example of the global integration to come. While each part of our group will be competitive in its own right, the global organization, which now employs over 12,500 people, will become stronger through strategic cooperation,” stated Sanjeev Gupta, executive chairman of GFG Alliance.