Turkish pipe producer Yucel Boru, which consumes one million mt of steel sheet per year, is getting ready to produce its own flat steel products, according to a report by the Turkish business newspaper Dunya.
The new flat steel production facility, which will be completed within three years in Gebze, Kocaeli in northwestern Turkey and which will have an annual output capacity of 1.5 million mt, will replace $1.1 billion worth of flat steel imports annually.
Accordingly, 20 percent of the flat steel products currently imported by Turkey will instead be produced domestically. Yucel Boru will invest $500 million in the new flat steel facility.
Kemal Sarac, managing director of Yucel Boru, stated that, with the investment, they are planning to provide raw materials for their own production, adding that the machinery in the new facility will be supplied from Europe.
Mr. Sarac went on to say that Turkey's flat steel imports will drop significantly, as Turkey will reach an annual flat steel production capacity of 20 million mt when Yucel Boru's new facility comes on stream in three years' time.
Meanwhile, Yucel Boru is also aiming to increase the annual production volume of its pipe facility in Iskenderun in southern Turkey, which was commissioned in 2005, to 400,000 mt, with a planned investment of $70 million.