Steel Wires Joint Venture Company for Cold Heading and Forging in USA (NSCI) holds an Opening Ceremony

Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corporation (hereinafter “NSSMC”) established “NIPPON STEEL & SUMIKIN COLD HEADING WIRE INDIANA INC. (hereinafter “NSCI”)”, an U.S. company manufacturing and selling steel wires for cold heading and forging, in February 2016.  NSCI has started its commercial production in April 2018, and on July 18th, held an opening ceremony, inviting the Governor of Indiana and other related Indiana and Shelbyville officials, Consulate-General of Japan in Chicago, customers, shareholders, and employee families.

Mr.Kimura, NSCI President and the host, expressed gratitude to all the people attending the Ceremony. He stated that the company will respond positively to all customers’ requests as a representative of the NSSMC Group in North America, and that NSCI will contribute to the community here in Indiana.

NSSMC will closely capture the globally growing demand for special steels by establishing this steel wire manufacturing plant, which will become its third overseas plant, in addition to those established in Thailand and China.  The new plant at NSCI has annual production capacity of 36,000 tons and is capable of manufacturing steel wires with a maximum diameter of 40 mm.  By making use of the plant’s proximity to customers, NSSMC will meet demand from the major production plants of Japanese automobile and parts manufacturers and display strong delivery capability.    
Steel wires for cold heading and forging*, which are produced by adding secondary processes (such as pickling, coating, wire drawing and heat treatment) to hot rolled wire rods, are mainly used for important safety-related parts such as automobile bolts.  Therefore, these steel wires require a very high quality mainly in terms of internal quality and surface defects.  In order to satisfy these requirements, NSSMC and NSCI are cooperating in performing strict and unified quality management for wire rods and steel wires.

Under the banner of SteeLinc^TM, the brand of NSSMC’s Bar & Wire Rod Unit, NSCI will contribute to enhance the value of customers’ products through proposals that optimize the combination of steel materials and secondary processes (steel materials x processing methods).  The steel product menu includes steel for high-strength bolts (MB series and ADS series) and steel that omits processes (such as new soft wire rods and untempered steel for cold forging (NHF^TM and SUC80D)), which maximize the potential of steel.

* See details on SteeLinc website, Steel Wires for Cold Heading and Forging Product page
　http://www.nssmc.com/en/steelinc/product/xsteelia/cold_heading.html

Company Profiles

Company Name: NIPPON STEEL & SUMIKIN COLD HEADING WIRE INDIANA INC. (NSCI)
Head Office: Shelbyville, Indiana
Business: Manufacture and sales of steel wire for cold heading and forging
Capital: US$24 million
President: Hideoki Kimura
Shareholders:
  Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corporation 42%; 
  Matsubishi Metal Industry Co., Ltd. 5%;
  Nippon Steel & Sumikin Steel Processing Co., Ltd. 5%;
  Miyazaki Seiko Co., Ltd. 5%; Sanyu Co., Ltd. 1%;
  Toyota Tsusho Corporation 12%;
   Nippon Steel & Sumikin Bussan Corporation 10%;
   Metal One Corporation 10%;Sumitomo Corporation 10%
Major Facilities: Pickling and coating line (1 unit); wire drawing machine (4 units); heat treatment furnace (2 units)
Capacity: 36,000 ton/year