Steel giant commissions major contract
Nov 14 2007 By Sarah Judd
INDIAN steel giant Tata has made a "significant investment" in a Tees Valley engineering firm after commissioning it for a major contract.
Siemens VAI at Stockton has won an order to build a new state-of-the-art blast furnace on behalf of Tata Steel, which acquired Corus for £6.2bn earlier this year.
The new blast furnace will be part of an integrated iron and steel works capable of producing six million tonnes of iron and steel each year at Kalinganagar in the state of Orissa, eastern India.
Siemens, which employs 175 on Teesside, confirmed seven new staff have already been employed locally on the back of the contract win, with more jobs likely.
A spokeswoman for Siemens VAI said: "Some more experienced staff will be needed on the project so they have got to be replaced.
"We will be employing more than the seven already taken on, in particular engineers."
Siemens was unable to announce the value of the contract citing contractual reasons, but described it as a "significant investment" in the company.
The company will also provide training, commissioning and start-up assistance on the project.
Siemens director of ironmaking Geoff Wingrove, said: "This Kalinganagar project again underlines the confidence that producers place in Siemens for the supply of proven, efficient, cost-effective and environmentally friendly blast-furnace solutions."
In May, Siemens announced it had secured another project with Tata, to re-build a blast furnace at Jamshedpur, India.
Siemens VAI is part of Metals Technologies (MT) a division of Siemens Group Industrial Solutions and Services (I&S).
The company employs about 400 permanent staff throughout its operations and has supplied more than 170 new blast furnaces and rebuilds across the world.
Tata is currently the world’s sixth largest producer of crude steel, with a worldwide annual production capacity of 28 million tonnes.
Tata’s buyout of Corus will create the world’s fifth largest steel group when it is fully integrated with the Anglo-Dutch firm, which employs 2,700 on Teesside.
