Sumitomo Metals (Kokura) to Ship More Special Steel Bar, Wire Rod

Sumitomo Metals (Kokura) tries to increase the supply of special steel bar and wire rod more in the full capacity operation in fiscal 2008 to meet strong demand from automakers and construction machinery makers. The firm utilizes the additional supply capacity when the firm stopped steel code wire rod production in December 2007 and stops nickel series stainless bar by September. Despite of the supply increase effort, the special steel bar and wire rod supply gets tighter for automobile and construction machinery when the users require more materials than the supply increase. The firm is integrated steel based bar and wire rod maker with a blast furnace, which was relined and expanded to 2,150 cubic meters of inner capacity in April 2004. The firm produced 1.44 million tonnes of raw steel in the year ended March 2008. The firm tries to increase the weight of special steel products to improve the profitability. The weight increased to 90% in fiscal 2007 ended March 2008 from around 85% in fiscal 2002. The firm ships near 80% of the products for automobile and the balance for construction machinery. The firm expects the domestic automobile output increases to 12 million units for finished car and to 9 million units for knockdown sets in fiscal 2008 compared with 11.79 million units and 8.5 million units in fiscal 2007.