Indian Seamless plans Australin venture with BSL, Breitenfeld Group

The Rs900-crore Indian Seamless Group, through its group companies Indian Seamless Steels & Alloys Ltd and India Seamless Metal Tubes, has signed a proposal to set up a a $275-million steel mill and seamless tube plant in Australia jointly with Boulder Steel Ltd (BSL), Australia and Breitenfeld Group, Austria for setting up a seamless tube plant in Australia. The project will be located at Ipswich, Queensland.

The Breitenfeld Group is a privately owned Austrian steel maker and the fourth largest producer of speciality steel ingots and billets and with a production capacity of 1,25,000 tonne per annum.
Boulder Steel is a fabricator of structural and miscellaneous steel, provider of joist, deck, erection and detailing services. The Indian Seamless group is the country's largest producer of seamless steel tubes with a 1,50,000 tonne per year capacity.

Indian Seamless will provide complete know-how and engineering services for setting up and operating the project and receive around 35 per cent equity in the project in exchange and with some financial investment. It will also help market globally up to 100,000 tonnes of seamless tubes per annum of the 350,000 tonne the Australian venture is expected to produce annually.

Together with Breitenfield, it will be the joint operator of the project and will provide detailed engineering, design, procurement and construction management for the project. The three companies have also agreed for a joint marketing of all three parties' products worldwide.

Other project partners include Australian Metal Recovery, will provide about Rs100 crore for the provision of scrap and slag handling facilities, and the Queensland government.