Seamless Pipe Production Increases to 1.02 Million Tonnes in the First Half of FY2005

Production of seamless steel pipes in the first half of fiscal 2005 was 1.02 million tonnes, up 7.1% from the same period of the previous fiscal year. The topside 6 makers’ seamless pipe production increased from the same period, and their ranking is unchanged. Seamless steel pipe export demand for oil well tubular increases sharply. JFE Steel is starting to increase chromium oil well tubular production capacity by 13%. Further, the domestic demand is firm mainly for industrial and construction machinery. Sumitomo Metal Industries and JFE Steel have performed increase of the production equipment to meet request of the pipe multiplication from their customers in recent years. The production in fiscal 2005 by Sumitomo Metal having the highest seamless steel pipe production share is likely to increase just over 50,000 tonnes from the previous fiscal year. The rest of the topside makers followed that increasing trend. The share difference between No. 1 and 2 makers was 39.4 points compared with 37.6 points in the same period of the previous fiscal year. The demand is likely to be firm both nationally and internationally after the second half of fiscal 2005. There is some possibility that the production will increase further in the future and special steel seamless pipe ratio will rise; high-quality seamless steel pipe demand tends to increase.