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Posco to buy Vietnam steel firm, build India plant
Posco, South Korea’s largest steelmaker, will buy a 90 percent stake in Vietnam’s Asia Stainless Corp. and build a plant in India after this week’s forecasts of a demand recovery in the second half.
The board of directors Friday approved buying Asia Stainless, known as ASC, the Pohang-based company said in an e-mailed statement without providing financial details on the purchase or the cost of the Indian plant.
Posco raised its 2009 output target on July 13, signaling the worst of the global slump in demand may be over. Demand for cold-rolled stainless steel in Vietnam was 110,000 tons last year while supply was 28,000 tons, Posco said Friday.
ASC, Vietnam’s only cold-rolled stainless steelmaker, has an annual capacity of 30,000 tons and plans to expand output to 85,000 tons by 2010, Posco said. The Korean company said in May it would also take control of a stainless steel unit at Taihan Electric Wire Co. in Korea.
The purchases of ASC and TaihanST Corp. will help Posco expand, the company said. Posco’s crude stainless steel capacity is 3 million tons a year, while its cold-rolled stainless steel capacity is 950,000 tons, it said.
Posco plans to build a galvanized-steel plate factory in western India with an annual capacity of 450,000 tons, and will begin production in 2012, according to Friday’s statement.
Consumption of steel plates in India will increase as automobile production is expected to more than double by 2015, the Korean steelmaker said.
thanhnien, Bloomberg
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