ArcelorMittal, the world's largest steelmaker, will spend $760 million to build a mill in Mexico and buy a coke plant in Pennsylvania, US.

The $600 million mill will produce steel for construction and car making, Luxembourg-based ArcelorMittal said today in a statement. The plant will make 1 million metric tons of steel billet a year and have a bar-rolling capacity of 500,000 tons. The site has yet to be selected.

The new plant is expected to feed the Mexican government's ambitious programmes to upgrade infrastructure and build additional housing in the country. The new facility will incorporate state of the art technology and steel processing to ensure it is both energy-efficient and environmentally responsible. It will also benefit from best practices that have been developed across the group's operations.

"We are delighted to be making this investment which underlines our commitment to the Mexican steel industry. Our plan calls for an investment of $600 million,'' said Gonzalo Urquijo, member of ArcelorMittal's group management board with responsibility for long products.

''We are presently evaluating potential sites for the mill in Mexico. The decision concerning the final location will be based upon a number of factors including logistics, supply chain and the availability of sufficient resources to run and operate the plant efficiently and responsibly,'' he added.

In a separate release, the company said it would pay $160 million to buy the Koppers' Monessen Coke Plant from Koppers Inc. to secure more of the fuel it needs to fire steel furnaces. The plant, built by the Pittsburgh Steel Company in 1941, had an output of 320,000 metric tons of coke last year.

The company buys all its coke from the facility in Monessen, Pennsylvania, but wants to gain more control of key steel ingredients - metallurgical coke and iron ore - as prices soar.

Even though ArcelorMittal supplies 20 per cent of its own requirement of coke at present, the company plans to increase this to 75 per cent by 2015 – understandable, considering the three-fold increase in its price this year itself. Moreover, these inflated prices are expected to sustain for long.

"This acquisition is an important step towards increasing our upstream self sufficiency in metallurgical coke production during a time when metallurgical coke demand on a global scale remains strong. ArcelorMittal currently purchases all of the coke produced by the Koppers' Monessen Coke Plant," said Sudhir Maheshwari, member of ArcelorMittal's group management board.

ArcelorMittal CEO Lakshmi Mittal is adding steel capacity in developing nations to feed rising investment in infrastructure and growing car use. The company is also increasing its supplies of raw materials as prices surge.

ArcelorMittal is the largest steel company in the world, with 310,000 employees in more than 60 countries. It has led the consolidation of the world steel industry and today ranks as the only truly global steelmaker.

The company was founded in 2006 when the then-top two steelmakers of the world - Mittal Steel and Arcelor - merged. It ranked at 39th position in Fortune Global 500 companies list. The company is headquartered in Luxembourg City, in southern Luxembourg, the former seat of Arcelor.

On revenue of $105.2 billion, the group had operating profits of $10.36 billion last year. It has a market capitalisation of $61.53 billion, with a major part of the equity held by group chairman and CEO Mittal and his family. His son Aditya is the CFO of the group. However, the group is far from being a family enterprise with several professionals and 11 independent directors on the governing board.