India-based steell producer Tata Steel has announced that it completed an important strategic project that makes it only the second vertically-integrated producer of grain-oriented electrical steels in the European Union.
As a result of collaboration between Tata employees in the Netherlands and south Wales, UK, grain-oriented (GO) electrical sheet produced by Tata Steel's Welsh-based subsidiary Cogent Power is now being manufactured using feedstock sourced from the company's IJmuiden works in the Netherlands.
By fully integrating its GO production route, Tata Steel has removed constraints on quality development and output that had existed because of previous dependence on third-party sources. Among the benefits of this will be greater ability to expand in fast-growing developing markets. The development will also enable all the value from the manufacture of this premium product range to be retained within the company.
Cogent Power general manager Mark Cichuta said, "I am delighted that several years of work with our research and manufacturing colleagues in the Netherlands have culminated in the successful integration of our process route in grain-oriented steels."
The project has extended to Tata Steel's GO steels production the vertical integration that already exists in the company's production of non-grain oriented (NGO) material. Tata Steel's Surahammar works in Sweden produces NGO feedstock also supplied from IJmuiden.