Tata Steelium targets 50% market share in Lanka

by Surekha Galagoda

Tata Steelium plans to achieve a 50 percent market share in Sri Lanka within the next 5-10 years particularly in the furniture manufacturing sector, an area in the cold rolled closed Annealed (CRCA) market, said Vice President (Flat products) Tata Steel Anand Sen.

He said that this was the first time in the world that branded CRCA known as Tata Steelium was introduced by Tata.

Sen said " we have been selling our products in Sri Lanka for the past 15 years and with time our focus has shifted from transactional sales to relationship based sales and to key accounts". He said that the demand in Sri Lanka has not grown significantly but we still have an opportunity to tap in the country and added that there is competition from importers in Sri Lanka.

CRCA is used for making consumer durables such as refrigerators, cars and furniture. At present we have one plant which manufactures 5-6 mln tonnes and are planning to set up another one shortly in Sri Lanka. At present Tata has steel plants and facilities in 44 countries employing over 84,000 while the main plant is at Jamshedpur India. The combined capacity of crude steel is 28.1 mln tonnes.

He said that they sell about 25-30 tonnes per month in India and their big buyers in the furniture market are Alfa, Handsteel and Damro and the car manufacturers in India. Sonic Steel Industries has been appointed as the sole distributor and will have a steelium pariwar (family) in Sri Lanka too, said Sen.

Established in 1907 as Asia's first integrated private sector steel company, Tata Steel today is the world's sixth largest steel producer with geographic footprints in India, South East Asia, UK and Europe. With the recent acquisition of Corus, the combined enterprise has a crude steel capacity of 28.1 million tonnes. Tata Steel's commitment to its employees and the community has resulted in over 77 years of industrial harmony.

Its steel works, mines and collieries and Jamshedpur are ISO 14001 certified for environment management. The company's Jamshedpur steel works along with its Ferro Alloys and Minerals Division, have been conferred the SA 8000 certification for work conditions and improvements in the workplace.

Tata Steelium offers superior product attributes, such as excellent formability, flatness, surface quality, thickness consistency and strength.

Tata Steel is also a major player in the galvanised and specialty wires business through its subsidiary M/s Lanka Special Steels. To further facilitate this change in focus, in the year 2006, a Liaison Office was set up in Sri Lanka. This has ensured a smooth and effective customer interface.

Tata Steelium which was launched in 2003 in India, serves a wide spectrum of customers including the auto ancillaries sector, the panel industry for electrical and telecom applications, furniture industry and drums and barrel industry.

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