South Korean steelmaker POSCO has been steadily growing in Vietnam. Today there are 13 offices and affiliates under the POSCO Vietnam Holdings umbrella. In addition to the biggest facility in Vung Tau, POSCO’s offices and facilities are located in Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi, Hai Duong, and Dong Nai, with operations in steel manufacturing, trading and construction, and sales and technical services.

Let’s take a look at POSCO Vietnam’s operations, with a focus on its three biggest ventures there: POSCO-VHPC, POSCO-VST and POSCO SS VINA.

Constant Growth for POSCO-VHPC

POSCO-VHPC (Vietnam Ho Chi Minh Processing Center) is responsible for machining, marketing and merchandizing the cold-rolled and stainless steel products of POSCO-Vietnam and POSCO-VST. Since starting operations in March 2008, POSCO-VHPC has seen impressive growth, with sales jumping from 136,000 tons in 2012 to 314,000 tons in 2015.

“We believe our operational know-how will lead us to our ultimate goal of becoming Vietnam’s No. 1 logistics and manufacturing business,” said Jung-min Jung, head of the carbon steel sales department.

POSCO-VHPC is also proud of its many philanthropic activities in Vietnam, working with the vision impaired, providing food to those in need, and running a variety of cultural programs.

“The repair team volunteers at a nearby shelter for the visually impaired,” points out Daeheon Jung, principal administrative officer at POSCO-VHPC. “We also run a soup kitchen for local residents. And to improve our organizational structure we operate a variety of events, like running an in-house library, annual team-building trips, cultural activities with employees’ families and Korean and English classes.”

POSCO-VST: Making the steel for people’s everyday lives

POSCO-VST (Vietnam Stainless Steel) is the production facility that produces all the stainless cold-rolled products—150,000 tons of 2B cold-rolled stainless, 75,000 tons of BA and 10,000 tons of precision materials.

2B? BA? “In a nutshell, ‘BA’ makes the steel bright, and 2B makes it dark,” explains Jaetak Bae, overseas president of POSCO-VST. “Depending on the heating methods, the way of surface treatment also differs. BA is related to high gloss. We use BA to make parts for mobile phones, most notably the USIM card.”

“POSCO-VST is currently aiming for 60 percent of the domestic market and 40 percent of the export market,” Bae continued. “Stainless is a material that can be used to make a variety of items, such as refrigerator containers, special containers and the roofs of buildings. As it can be easily found in our everyday lives, dominating both the domestic and exports markets is critical to achieving high profitability.”

In addition, POSCO-VST is looking to work with Vietnam’s stainless steel industry. Recently, it joint-hosted a seminar with the Vietnam Steel Association in Ho Chi Minh and Hanoi, exploring trends in the stainless steel industry. “The seminar was more than just a forum for sharing information,” said Bae. “It was a great opportunity to improve production and awareness of POSCO-VST and promote demand for stainless steel.”

POSCO SS VINA gets international recognition

Established in 2010, POSCO SS VINA is younger than POSCO-VHPC and POSCO-VST, but that means it also has some of the most modern facilities. The main products of POSCO SS VINA are section steel, iron bar and billet. In fact, this was the first time POSCO ever tried producing section steel and iron bar, so securing technical skills and competitiveness was a major goal.

“There were a lot of complications for Korean companies’ steel to enter Vietnam’s steel market in the beginning,” said Taeju Lee, overseas president of POSCO SS VINA. “However, now our technique has been internationally recognized, which has enabled us to export to Korea, and expand in the Vietnam market.”

A Q&A with POSCO Vietnam Employees
For POSCO, working closely with the people of Vietnam is an essential part of its operations there—which is why POSCO takes pride in its close relationships with the local employees. Go capture a sense of POSCO’s relationship with its Vietnamese employees, we talked with five of them about their experiences with and feelings about POSCO.

Q: What does ‘POSCO’ mean to you?

Bich: The word “professional” comes up to my mind. When I see my colleagues, every single person has a specialty of their own. I always learn a lot from their continuous efforts at self-improvement.

Khoa: As Vietnam’s economy is quite active and has high growth potential, it is very important for each individual to possess “business skills” for what they do. POSCO has many great support programs, enabling employees to build a variety of skills.

Thao: POSCO is my first job. The company supports us on many different levels, which makes me feel proud to be working here.

Q: POSCO has five elements to its brand identity: Co-prosperity, Enrichment, Fundamentals, Inspiring and Trust. What do you think describes POSCO the best?      

Sang: “Inspiring”, because POSCO strives to find new things be inspiring.

Trung: I think “Trust” best describes POSCO. If we try to build trust before we establish a new relationship, I think the potential to develop together also grows. For example, if I can’t trust my colleague, it would be hard to achieve anything. But if we trust each other, we will definitely find the power to do anything.

Q: If you were to describe POSCO in one word?

Khoa: “Huge.” I feel like POSCO has a lot more than the physical greatness. When Vietnam’s infinite growth potential meets POSCO, it will be more powerful.

Thao : “Challenge.” Everything I do at POSCO is challenging and those tasks give me the power and passion to try new things.

For nearly a decade, POSCO has been one of the major steel leaders in Vietnam, creating a variety of products people need throughout their everyday lives. Today, POSCO-Vietnam is thriving, thanks to the highest-quality steel products and close relationships with the people of Vietnam.

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POSCO-America is a subsidiary of South Korean steelmaker POSCO. It operates steel production and processing facilities as well as sales offices and technical service centers to better serve customers. It is also responsible for the execution of its growth strategy and management of existing subsidiaries and investments. POSCO-America is constantly creating remarkable value through high quality products and innovative solutions. Let’s get to know POSCO-America and take a look at some of its activities.

Representing Global Corporations

POSCO-America has been around for over thirty years since its establishment in 1984 and its role has expanded greatly from the initial management of its joint venture UPI (USS-POSCO Industries). Today, POSCO-America’s role includes sales development, technical solutions, customer servi
ces as well as management of POSCO group companies in the Americas.

Wonki Kim, president of POSCO-America said, “POSCO-America is striving to generates synergies amongst our various entities as POSCO’s representative company in the Americas.” POSCO is also committed to this objective. In fact, POSCO has invested a total of $1.9B in the Americas spread over 25 entities since POSCO- AMERICA’s establishment. POSCO has made various investments in steel production & processing facilities, sales offices and technical service centers to better serve customers in the Americas region.

In addition to its headquarters in New Jersey, POSCO- AMERICA’s footprint extends beyond the US to Mexico and South America.

Since its inauguration as the representative company in March of 2015, POSCO-America carries itself with a larger sense of responsibility. Kim stated, “Figuring out how to generate synergy projects amongst the various POSCO family companies in the Americas is what matters most.” POSCO- AMERICA is also focused on creating value for customers through Solution Marketing which incorporates application technology (technical solution), customer support (commercial solution), and heart-to-heart relationship (human solution).

Global One POSCO Opens Lines of Communication

Communication is often said to be the key to success and POSCO makes a great effort to maintain an open line of communication. In fact, the company shares all of its ideas through a Synergy Portal where members of each POSCO family company can join and suggest ideas as well as opinions at any time. Even results of each meetings are shared without omission through this system.

According to Young Jin Kim, CFO of POSCO- AMERICA, the Synergy Portal serves as an infrastructure in maximizing POSCO- AMERICA’s efficiency and competitiveness by allowing the free flow of ideas, information, opinions, questions, and suggestions.

Building Communities

POSCO- AMERICA makes great effort to create a sense of unity and solidarity among employees. One of the ways POSCO-America pursues this cooperative environment is by involving in a diverse range of community activities. These activities include repairing rundown houses, volunteering to distribute food for people in need, and tree planting.

POSCO-America also holds a monthly meeting where all employees discuss the overall performance of the company. Each department shares its performance, issues and plans. Through this activity Young Jin Kim hopes to “raise a sense of corporate belonging and pride as employees of POSCO.”

Different studies conducted around the world show that sharing a meal together can create and build a sense of community among colleagues. For this reason, POSCO- AMERICA incorporates a large and open multi-purpose area where employees can congregate and enjoy lunch together. Even in the workspace, POSCO-America employees can interact freely with each other due to this open space design.

And this is only the beginning. “We’re in the process of creating a mentoring program to increase employee satisfaction,” noted Young Jin Kim. “This program will match a supervisor or any manager with entry-level employees, and build an environment where mentors can provide useful tips to entry-level employees.”

POSCO-America has its future mapped out and the aim is to build a bond, not only within the company, but also the local community. POSCO is truly creating a sense of belonging for POSCO-America, its employees and the local people and has many more fun and engaging activities lined up for 2016.

 
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