Indian steelmaker Tata Steel intends to increase its investment in China by five percent in 2012 as it seeks to maintain its market share, Tata Steel managing director Hemant Madhusudan Nerurkar has said in an interview with China Daily.
Mr. Nerurkar said that the Chinese steel industry has developed in the last 10 years at an "admirable" speed and that he expects the company's business in China to grow at the same rate as the country's steel consumption growth, i.e., by five to seven percent year on year.
Apart from local demand, Tata Steel also expects to export more products from its Chinese mills to Europe and Japan, both being markets that require external supplies, he said.
Currently, the company is not considering entering into partnerships with Chinese steel companies, Mr. Nerurkar said, adding that it has not ruled out the possibility of developing downstream partnerships at some point in the future.