NORTH AMERICA
Hot Rolled Products
|
 |
|
|
NORTH AMERICA - SHOWING STRENGTH
In North America, our strategic focus is on further building our downstream businesses - the Butler Buildings and Vistawall groups - and supporting our joint venture interests in North Star BlueScope Steel and Castrip LLC. The Company is now well placed to benefit from the strength of the North American economy.
The acquisition of Butler Manufacturing Company in 2004 significantly accelerated our global downstream strategy, initially in North America and Asia, and more recently in Thailand and India where we are developing PEB Design Centres of Excellence. In just 26 months, we have turned Butler around from a loss-making business by cutting costs, improving safety, investing in new manufacturing facilities, and investing in our people.
Hot Rolled Products North America achieved a record year of steel production and despatches. This business comprises our 50 per cent interest in the North Star BlueScope Steel mini mill at Delta, Ohio, our joint venture interest in Castrip LLC, which is commercialising revolutionary steel technology, and our North American and European export trading activities.
We have made great progress towards our vision of being the leading supplier of flat steel building solutions in North America. The United States is now our largest export destination and, after Australia, our second-largest domestic market.
 |
DELTA, OHIO, USA |
HOT ROLLED PRODUCTS
NORTH STAR BLUESCOPE STEEL
North Star BlueScope Steel uses leading-edge steelmaking technologies and processes to produce steel from scrap metal. Record annual raw steel production of 1.92 million tonnes was well matched by record annual despatches of 1.883 million tonnes.
These results are largely due to the ongoing improvement in operating efficiencies and have contributed $168 million in dividends to BlueScope Steel for 2005/06, up by $45 million dollars. The business is positioning itself to take advantage of continuing strong demand in the general manufacturing and construction sectors in the US.
Despite these gains, overall EBIT for the business group decreased by $11 million to $188 million, mainly as a result of reduced margins with hot rolled coil prices declining more than the price of scrap feedstock.
For the fourth consecutive year, the highly regarded Jacobson Survey of steel customers voted North Star BlueScope Steel the number one flat rolled steel supplier to the service centre segment in North America. This survey reviews over 30 steel mills on quality, service, on-time delivery and overall customer satisfaction.
CASTRIP LLC
The joint venture company Castrip LLC
was formed to develop, market and licence
a breakthrough technology, pioneered by
Port Kembla Steelworks, to directly cast molten steel into thin hot rolled coil.
The Castrip process provides an opportunity for lower investment, reduced energy consumption and smaller scale plants.
Our partners in the business are Nucor (47.5%) and IHI of Japan (5%). Castrip continues to move closer to commercialising the strip casting technology. Nucor's Crawfordsville, Indiana plant uses the Castrip® process and has significantly improved its quality and productivity over the last six months. During the year, Nucor announced its intention to build a second Castrip® plant in Arkansas.
SALES OFFICES
Our dedicated sales teams in North America and Europe continue to build and expand strong customer relationships. During the year, they made an outstanding contribution in being able to sell the markedly increased tonnages of exports from Australia, New Zealand and Asia.
