Prominent European Steel Consortium Signs MOU With e-STEEL; Rautaruukki, Riva, Voest-Alpine Stahl Select e-STEEL to Develop Comprehensive e-Commerce Portal for European Steel Industry.s Business Editors NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 28, 2000 e-Commerce in the $700 billion steel industry has entered an important new global phase of expansion. Prominent European steel producers, Rautaruukki Group, Riva Group, Voest-Alpine Stahl AG, and the independent steel trading company, Voest-Alpine Intertrading AG announced today that the companies signed a Memorandum of Understanding A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) is a legal document describing a bilateral or multilateral agreement between parties. It expresses a convergence of will between the parties, indicating an intended common line of action and may not imply a legal commitment. (MOU (Minutes Of Usage) A metric used to compute billing and/or statistics for telephone calls or other network use. ) with the leading negotiation-based, B2B (Business to Business) Refers to one business communicating with or selling to another. See B2B e-commerce, B2C and B2G. B2B - business to business global steel marketplace, e-STEEL Corporation to develop an open e-Commerce marketplace for the entire European steel industry. The new European site will operate as a joint venture between these leading steel companies, and e-STEEL. The companies are also approaching other major European industry participants - suppliers as well as customers - to join this open and neutral partnership. The four European steel companies combined produce and trade more than 25 million tons of steel and steel products, about 20% of total European production, thus providing significant liquidity to the new European marketplace. e-STEEL brings established and proven e-Commerce technology, expertise in marketplace operations, and supply chain management. The MOU is also significant in that it signals an important evolution in B2B e-Commerce (Business to Business Electronic-COMMERCE) Refers to one business selling to another business via the Web. See e-commerce. whereby a consortium of traditional steel producers and a steel trader align with an existing, independent B2B exchange, like e-STEEL, to cooperate, build, and operate a new "best of both worlds" exchange model, powered by e-STEEL enabled technology. The goal of the new site is to create the most advanced e-Commerce steel marketplace in Europe that supports the specific business requirements of the European steel market and is not biased towards sellers or buyers. The new European site will create value for all participating companies in the European steel value chain including, mills, service centers, processors, stockists, end users, and trading companies. Accessing the global steel community via the e-STEEL Exchange is another clear advantage of this new site. In addition to a "localized" marketplace function, plans for the new site also include value-added services A value-added service (VAS) is a telecommunications industry term for non-core services or, in short, all services beyond standard voice calls and fax transmissions. such as credit, transportation, and logistics, as well as a broad range of steel industry related news and targeted content dedicated to the European market. The new company will also provide collaborative commerce and supply chain applications that improve inventory management and significantly reduce carrying costs Carrying costs Costs that increase with increases in the level of investment in current assets. from the mill to the end user. "The European market represents one of the largest and most complex steel markets in the world," said e-STEEL CEO (1) (Chief Executive Officer) The highest individual in command of an organization. Typically the president of the company, the CEO reports to the Chairman of the Board. , Chairman, and Founder Michael S. Levin lev·in n. Archaic Lightning. [Middle English levene, levin; see leuk- in Indo-European roots.] . "Thus, this initiative, with four of Europe's leading steel companies, is an essential development in the global expansion of steel e-Commerce. It is also another strong example of our ability to develop new customized solutions to meet the specific needs of the steel industry throughout the world," Levin added. Revenues will be derived from fees and transactions. Subject to negotiation of final contracts, the companies anticipate that will begin transactions in the 4th quarter of 2000. About e-STEEL New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of City-based, e-STEEL Corporation (www.e-steel.com) is the leading negotiation-based, neutral e-Commerce marketplace for prime and secondary steel products serving the $700 billion global steel industry. Its electronic commerce solution web site unites steel buyers and sellers and provides an array of resources for sales and purchasing professionals throughout the steel industry. More than 3,000 companies, from 90 countries have become members of e-STEEL, representing all of the key segments of the complex steel value chain. Founded in September 1998, e-STEEL has 130 employees and additional offices in Chicago, Pittsburgh, Detroit, Atlanta, Brussels, Tokyo, and Singapore. e-STEEL is backed by a blue-chip group of 15 strategic investors led by Goldman Sachs The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc., or simply Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) is one of the world's largest global investment banks. Goldman Sachs was founded in 1869, and is headquartered in the Lower Manhattan area of New York City at 85 Broad Street. & Co. Recently, e-STEEL also completed significant strategic alliances with Ford Motor Company, U. S. Steel Group, Dofasco Inc., Ispat International Ispat International N.V. is a steel producing company with operations in Mexico, Trinidad, Canada, Germany. The company is specialised in the integrated mini-mill process and has a wide range of flat & long steel products, including slabs & wire rods. , National Steel, Worthington Steel, Rouge Steel, and USS-Posco. Last week, e-STEEL also signed an MOU with BHP BHP blood hydrostatic pressure; the pressure exerted by the blood cells and plasma in the capillaries. to develop an Australian e-Commerce portal. About Rautaruukki Group: Rautaruukki Group (www.rautaruukki.com) is the leading Scandinavian steel producer, headquartered in Helsinki. The Group produces nearly 5 million tons of crude steel annually with a total of 12,000 employees. Major part of the production is high value-added products marketed with brand names. Annual turnover is around Euro 2,7 million. About Riva Group: The RIVA GROUP is the largest steel company in Italy and among the most important steel producers in the world. It is owned and managed, from the establishment of the company in 1954, by the founder Emilio Riva today together with his four sons and two nephews. The Group is present with its production facilities in eight different countries inside and outside the EU and can offer to its customers a wide range of products, both long and flat, in all quality of carbon steel out of stainless and high alloy grades. In the year 1999 the Riva group produced 14.1 millions tons of crude steel, registered a turnover of 4.075 millions of EUR EUR In currencies, this is the abbreviation for the Euro. Notes: The currency market, also known as the Foreign Exchange market, is the largest financial market in the world, with a daily average volume of over US $1 trillion. and achieved a net profit of 230 millions of EUR. The industrial policy of the Group is focused to satisfy the requests of different costumers in different markets providing all the range of long and flat products with a high level of service. About Voest-Alpine Stahl AG: Voest-Alpine Stahl Group (www.voest.co.at), which has been listed on the Austrian Stock Exchange See Wiener Börse. since October 1995, is the largest steel producer in Austria and at same time one of the biggest industrial enterprises of the country. In the business year 1999/2000, the crude steel production amounted to nearly 5 million tons. With a turnover of EUR 2.7 billion, the company achieved a net profit for the year of EUR 128.9 million. In the business year 1999/2000, 76% of the turnover in the group was attributed to flat products and 24% to long products. The core business of the group focuses on the development, production, processing and sale of high-quality steel products. About Voest-Alpine Intertrading AG Voest-Alpine Intertrading (www.vait.com) - an independent company to the Voest Alpine Group - is an international trading company with head office in Linz, Austria. The steel division of the company has an annual turnover of up to two million tons of steel products. With this volume, Voest-Alpine Intertrading ranks as one of the world's leading international steel traders. Products range from semi-finished products, long products, flat products to finished products. The steel marketing activities are worldwide. For sourcing, Voest-Alpine Intertrading has cooperation with leading steel producers in CIS countries There are two lists concerning CIS countries:
The countries of eastern Europe, especially those that were allied with the USSR in the Warsaw Pact, which was established in 1955 and dissolved in 1991. and Latin America Latin America, the Spanish-speaking, Portuguese-speaking, and French-speaking countries (except Canada) of North America, South America, Central America, and the West Indies. . |
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