The Hindu : Business : Industry should develop steel for auto sector

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Wednesday, Nov 29, 2006
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Industry should develop steel for auto sector

Special Correspondent

Investments in research and development crucial

KOLKATA: A lot more initiatives are needed to be taken by the steel industry to meet the needs of the automotive sector. Investments in R&D are crucial and the steel industry has to partner the auto industry in its growth path, S. K. Roongta, Chairman, Steel Authority of India Ltd., said here on Tuesday.

Speaking at the inaugural session of a seminar on steel in auto components and construction, he announced that SAIL would invest Rs. 9,500-10,000 crore by 2010 in in the Burnpur plant of IISCO.

Mr. Roongta later told The Hindu that machinery orders worth Rs. 6,000-crore would be placed by March 2007 based on global bids that were floated for this purpose.

T. K. Mukherjee, Deputy Managing Director, Tata Steel, was in agreement with the SAIL Chairman on need for increased investments to meet the auto industry's needs.

Consortium approach

He said a consortium approach would be needed between steel makers, auto producers and R & D institutes to face the challenge of producing lighter and stronger steels for the auto sector, since India was likely to emerge as the world's hub for low cost compact cars.

Talking to reporters later, Mr. Mukherjee said that even as the offer for Corus remained valid, Tata Steel's domestic projects and plans were all on schedule. By 2009-10, it would become a ten-million-tonne producer and this would happen without any addition of blast furnaces to its existing strength of eight at Jamshedpur. It would produce 6.8 million tonnes by 2007, the company's centenary year, he said.

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