l Signed a contract with China’s HBIS Group to establish a joint venture for automotive steel sheets
l CEO Jeong-woo Choi said, “We will reinforce our position as a supplier in the world’s largest automotive steel sheet market, China.”
l Responds to the local needs of automakers in China by establishing a local production and sales system for automotive steel sheets
POSCO (CEO Jeong-woo Choi) signs a contract with China’s HBIS Group Co., Ltd (河钢集团有限公司, HBIS) to set up a joint venture for production and sales of automotive steel sheet in China.
The two companies held a signing ceremony online attended by POSCO CEO Jeong-woo Choi, Head of Steel Business Unit Hag-dong Kim, President of HBIS Yu Yong, and General Manager of HBIS Wang Lanyu and decided to set up a 50:50 joint venture on the 25th.
“Through the partnership with HBIS Group, we plan to reinforce our position as the most competitive automotive steel sheet supplier in the world’s largest automotive steel sheet market, China,” CEO Jeong-woo Choi said during the signing ceremony.
HBIS, the second largest steelmaker in China and the third-largest steelmaker in the world producing 44 million tons of crude steel as of 2020, is on the list of Fortune Global 500 along with POSCO.
POSCO and HBIS plan to build a plant with a production capacity of 900,000 tons of galvanized steel sheets in the economic development zone of Laoting County, Tangshan City in Hebei Province by investing a total of US$600 million, with US$300 million each and aim to start construction in next January and complete it by the end of 2023.
In addition, it plans to incorporate Guangdong CGL(Continuous Galvanizing Line) which is currently operated by POSCO in Guangdong Province, China, and has an annual production capacity of 450,000 tons of steel sheets as a subsidiary company into the joint venture. As a result, the joint venture will have a production capacity of 1.35 million tons and the two companies will supply half of the cold-rolled coil (Full Hard), depending on their ratio of share.
POSCO expects to establish a stable supply system in response to the continuously growing demand for automotive steel plates in China upon this opportunity of cooperating with HBIS.
China, the No.1 automobile producer in the world that produced 25 million units, which is 32% of the world’s automobile production last year, is expected to continue to grow as the world’s largest demand market for automotive steel sheets in the future.
▲ POSCO sets up a joint venture with HBIS for the production and sales of automotive steel sheets in China, the world’s largest automotive steel sheet market. The photo shows the overall view of Guangdong CGL, which is scheduled to be incorporated as a subsidiary of the joint venture.