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British Stainless Steel Association hosts Outokumpu.

Date: Sunday, May 1 2005

Juha Rantanen, Outokumpu's new CEO, appointed at the close of 2004, was guest speaker at this year's British Stainless Steel Association lunch held in Sheffield on 13th April.

This closely followed his address to the Annual Meeting of Outokumpu

in Helsinki, on 8th April in which he confirmed Outokumpu's near 100% commitment to stainless steel having shed the last of its historical copper origins when it divested its fabricated copper products business to Nordic Capital in early April. The company, which was established to mine a copper deposit located near the town of Outokumpu in Finland at the turn of the 20th century and later expanded into zinc mining, decided some two years ago that it was not a sufficiently large player in the mining field and hence exited this to concentrate on becoming one of the world's largest producers of stainless steel. The reason for this, said Mr Rantanen, was stainless' attractive growth prospects with output growing 6-7%t annually.

The company has retained its technology division, which reported sales of 423M [euro] in 2004 and made an operating profit of 29M [euro] (or comparable profit of 8.0M [euro]). This contrasts with sales of 4637M [euro] and comparable profit of 425M [euro] for the Stainless Division. The technology division benefits from the sale of former Lurgi technologies following the acquisition of Lurgi's metallurgical plant interests in exchange for Outokumpu's mining equipment interests.

Outokumpu has stainless production facilities in Sheffield, England, Avesta, Sweden and Tornio, Finland. Tornio is very much the largest plant and is located close to chromite deposits at Kemi, mined by Outokumpu, the company's only remaining interest in ore extraction. Output there in 2004 was 1.2Mt ore converted to 580kt of concentrate. This is smelted to ferrochrome at Tornio where it is fed as hot metal to the AODs to provide the chromium alloying requirement for production of stainless steel. The hot metal feed significantly reduces energy requirements and therefore costs.

Much investment has gone into Tornio to increase capacity to 1.65Mt/y of metal production of which 750kt/y will be finished as cold rolled product making it the world's largest dedicated stainless producers (see STI June 04 p56). In March, a new production record was set at the new cold rolling mill (RAP5).

In addition, make sure to read these articles:

  • New BSSA director.
  • Nigel Ward, the Group Manager for Market and Trade Political Affairs at Outokumpu Stainless, has been appointed the new Director of the British Stainless Steel ......
  • International events diary.
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  • International events diary.
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  • AGA And Outokumpu Sign New Agreement Valued...
  • LIDING, Sweden,--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov 17, 1998--AGA has signed a new long-term gas supply agreement with the Finnish Outokumpu Group. The agreement is worth 250 million USD....
  • Sale of Norzink zinc smelter to Outokumpu.
  • Business Editors LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 31, 2001 A sale and purchase agreement by Rio Tinto (NYSE: RTP) and Boliden to sell the Norzink zinc smelter in ......
  • Aur Resources Inc. Terminates Agreement to...
  • TORONTO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 1, 1999--Aur Resources Inc. (TSE:AUR.) ("Aur") announces that it has terminated its agreement in principle with Outokumpu Base Metals Oy ("Outokumpu") to purchase ......
  • Sales up 7% for Outokumpu. (Europe).
  • The stainless division of Outokumpu enjoyed a successful second quarter, with net sales increasing 7% over the first quarter due to an increase in sales ......
  • Canaco Resources Ltd. Announces Outokumpu...
  • WEST VANCOUVER, British Columbia--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 27, 1998--Cusip #: 134909209 Mr. J. Malcolm Bell, President and Director, reports that Outokumpu Mines Inc., the Canadian subsidiary of ......
  • Rio Tinto Announces Completion of Sale of Norzink...
  • Business Editors LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 17, 2001 Rio Tinto (NYSE: RTP) and Boliden have completed the sale of the Norzink zinc smelter in Norway to Outokumpu ......
  • Outokumpu stainless focuses scheduling.
  • Outokumpu's service centres based in Solbiate (Varese) and Opera (Milan) in Italy carry out the finishing of coils such as slitting, cut-to-length, polishing and blanking....
  • Outokumpu aiming for top position in stainless.
  • Outokumpu's Board of Directors has concluded that the Group's future strategic aspirations will be based upon leadership in stainless steel. To support this development, Outokumpu's ......
  • Outokumpu to reduce AvestaPolarit share. (Europe).
  • Outokumpu plans to decrease its ownership in AvestaPolarit in stages, after committing itself to reducing its shareholding in the company to 40%. In the shareholder's ......
  • New business structure for Outokumpu.
  • Following Outokumpu's new organisational structure effective on April 1, 2005, the Group's main business, stainless steel, has been organised according to product types into two ......
  • Outokumpu seals Lurgi acquisition.
  • Outokumpu Technology has finalised the 52M [euro] acquisition of the Lurgi Metallurgie from the German mg technologies. The acquisition could potentially increase net sales for ......
  • European Commission Clears the Proposed Merger...
  • Business Editors STOCKHOLM, Sweden--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 4, 2000 The European Commission has cleared the proposed merger between Avesta Sheffield AB (publ) and Outokumpu Steel Oyj to ......