Nippon&SMI joint venture brings some plant closures
As previously reported by SteelOrbis on June 23, Nippon Steel Corp. and Sumitomo Metal Ind. (SMI) decided to merge their
stainless steel operations, scheduled to take place on October 1, 2003. In compliance with this desicion, except Sumitomo's strip business, Nippon Steel's main
stainless steel plant at Hikari and rolling mills together with the
plate mill at the Yawata works and
stainless facilities at Sumitomo Metal's Kashima plant will be taken over. New firm, to be named Nippon Steel Sumikin
Stainless Corp. (NSSC), will have a product range of
stainless slabs, billets, sheets, plates, bars and wires.
This joint venture is expected to reduce operating expenses considerably and enable companies to close operations with low productivity, such as cold rolling mills, annealing & pickling lines both at Hikari and Kashima and the heavy
plate levelling line at Kashima.