Tata Steel Nederland and Volkswagen are developing high-strength steel for the automotive industry

A European consortium led by Tata Steel Nederland, in collaboration with the Volkswagen Group, is working on a new generation of ultra-high-strength steel for automotive bodies. This is stated in the company’s press release.

The new material is expected to make future vehicles safer, more durable, and more energy-efficient to manufacture. The project is being implemented with European funding under the WarP-AHSS initiative, which will run from 2023 to 2027.

In addition to Tata Steel Nederland and the Volkswagen Group, the consortium includes RWTH Aachen University, the National Center for Metallurgical Research (CENIM) in Spain, RISE Research Institutes of Sweden, and the French Corrosion Institute. The research team is focused on developing steel for car bodies that can be pressed at lower temperatures than current ultra-high-strength grades used for passive safety components.

In the market, such products are primarily used for structures designed to withstand impact loads during a collision. Currently, such steels are typically formed at very high temperatures. When combined with zinc coatings, this can cause cracking, so automakers often use steels with aluminum-silicon coatings, which withstand heating but offer poorer corrosion protection. The new material is designed to overcome these limitations.

Tata Steel Nederland notes that the new steel will combine ultra-high strength with good formability, which will allow for better absorption of impact energy and improved passenger safety. An additional advantage is the ability to galvanize the steel, which is unusual for existing solutions in this class and should significantly improve corrosion resistance.

The developers also highlight the manufacturing benefits. Lower forming temperatures mean lower energy consumption, and the elimination of certain additional processing steps, particularly sandblasting, is expected to make production simpler and cheaper. A reduction in equipment wear and maintenance costs is also anticipated.

The Volkswagen Group emphasizes that the new steel product is designed to meet the demands of future automotive manufacturing, combining improved safety performance, simpler production processes, and lower costs. Tata Steel Nederland, for its part, views the development as part of a strategy to create more sustainable steel production.

As a reminder, EUROFER expects production in the European automotive sector to grow by 1.4% year-on-year in 2026. At the same time, production volumes will remain significantly below the pre-crisis levels of 2019.