OREANDA-NEWS. On January 18, 2007 having carefully studied the request of Metinvest Group to concentrate controlling stock in hot-rolled plate production plants Trametal SpA (Italy) and Spartan UK Ltd (the UK), the European Commission said the requested economic concentration completely meets provisions of Council Regulation №139/2004 of Commission Notice that cover simplified procedure for consideration of certain shareholding concentration transactions, reported the press-centre of Metinvest.

The Commission approved the transaction as the one meeting general market principles and agreement of the European Economic Zone according to Cl. 6(1)(b) of Council Regulations (EU) №139/2004.

Purchase of hot-rolled plate production plants Trametal SpA (Italy) and Spartan UK Ltd (the UK) from Malacalza Group was announced by Metinvest Group in early November, 2007. They are to be merged into a single production process with rolling mill Ferriera Valsider Sp.A. (Italy) also owned by Metinvest Group. The rolling facilities are to be merged into one company.

Igor Syry, CEO of Metinvest Holding, said: “We are certain two new enterprises will successfully integrate into the current business model of Metinvest Group. These enterprises will be merged with our plant in Italy into a single business Metinvest Holding Italy S.p.a. This will help us produce over 1m tones of hot-rolled plate on the EU market annually. This will certainly improve position of domestic mining and metal industry on global markets and ensure growth of the Ukrainian economy”.

Information for journalists:
Metinvest Group is the leading mining and metals holding in the region and one of the leading players in the global iron and steel industry. Companies of the Group produce over 10,5 million tonnes of steel and over 38 million tonnes of iron ore raw materials annually not only covering the Group’s own demand, but also acting as a key supplier for other Ukrainian steel companies.

OOO Metinvest Holding is the managing company of Metinvest Group. OOO Metinvest Holding is owned by Dutch company Metinvest B.V. (51,15%) and ZAO SCM (48,85%). 75% of Metinvest B.V. is owned by SCM ltd. (Cyprus), a subsidiary of ZAO SCM, while another 25% belongs by Smart N.V.

Metinvest Group is the largest privately-owned corporation in Ukraine and is a leading player in the world steel industry. Metinvest is a vertically-integrated holding with assets in coal and iron ore mining; coke production; iron ore enrichment; and steel and steel product production. Businessman Rinat Akhmetov owns 90% of ZAO SCM. Smart N.V. (the Netherlands) is a holding company of business group of Vadim Novinskiy.

Trametal SpA and Spartan UK Ltd are plate rolling facilities located in San Giorgio di Nogaro, Italy and Newcastle, UK, respectively. The companies had combined sales of more than ?370 million and produced more than 536,000 tonnes of plate in 2006.

Ferriera Valsider is a facility producing plate and hot-rolled coil located in Verona, Italy. It had sales of more than ?265 million and produced 515,000 tons of rolled-steel products in 2006.