ArcelorMittal, SAIL move ahead with $1 bn automotive steel JV

ArcelorMittal, the world's top steel maker and India's state-owned Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) have discussed the contours of their proposed $1-billion joint venture project for manufacturing high-end automotive steel in India.

Union minister of steel Chaudhary Birender Singh along with SAIL chairman P K Singh and the joint secretary in the ministry of steel Sunil Barthwal on Tuesday visited the London offices of ArcelorMittal to discuss the proposed $1 billion automotive steel joint venture.

Lakshmi Mittal, chairman and CEO, Aditya Mittal, group CFO and CEO ArcelorMittal Europe and Brian Aranha, executive vice president and head of global automotive, who is leading the joint venture discussions on behalf of ArcelorMittal, attended the meeting along with other members of senior management.

ArcelorMittal and SAIL signed a memorandum of understanding in May 2015 to explore the possibility of setting up a state-of-the-art automotive steel manufacturing facility under a JV arrangement in India.

The proposed JV will construct world-class facilities for manufacturing automotive steel that will offer technologically advanced steel products for India's rapidly growing automotive sector. The hot rolled input products for the proposed facility would be supplied by SAIL's new state-of-the-art hot strip mill in Rourkela, Odisha, thus making the entire value chain indigenous.

The project's joint working group, which was established following the signing of the MoU, has completed the major part of the project's feasibility report.

India is forecast to become the world's third largest automobile manufacturing nation by 2026, with passenger vehicles likely to grow from approximately 3 million units at present to over 7 million units in the next 10 years.

The proposed steel plant supports both the growing level of automotive demand and the Indian government's 'Make In India' programme, which aims to transform India into a global manufacturing hub, ArcellorMittal stated in a release.