Japan’s JFE Steel and India’s JSW are planning a joint venture

The Japanese company JFE Steel intends to create a joint venture (JV) with JSW Steel in India by the end of 2022. Reuters reports about it.

The joint venture will produce electrical steel sheet, which is used in power plant transformers.

Thus, the second largest steel producer in Japan, which is part of JFE Holdings, aims to increase the growth rate in the Indian market by offering special steel products.

In 2021, JFE announced the preparation of a feasibility study for a JV with JSW Steel, in which JFE holds 15% stake, as India’s power demand is growing rapidly.

As Reuters notes, Japanese steelmakers are expanding their capacities in India while trimming their output capacity at home. In particular, Nippon Steel, JFE’s biggest competitor, plans to almost double crude steel output capacity at its India’s Hazira plant, despite a global economic slowdown and weak demand in China. This was announced at the beginning of September 2022.

Earlier, JFE Steel also announced about investments in the amount of $1 billion in reducing greenhouse gas emissions programs. The company’s plans expected a 20% reduction in emissions by 2030 through eco-modernization of its steel plants around the world, including the modernization of its main steelmaking basic oxygen furnaces (BOFs).

As GMK Center reported earlier, exports of rolled products from India in August 2022 fell by 66% y/y – up to 454 thousand tons. At the same time, steel production in India in August 2022 increased by 2% compared to August 2021 – up to 10.3 million tons. This index has been increasing for seventeen months in a row.