A single global company with 18 million tonnes of rolled-steel capacity per annum is to be launched through a consolidation of GFG Alliance’s steel businesses.

The family-owned alliance has announced that Liberty Steel Group, which employs 30,000 people in 10 countries, will be incorporated by the end of this year through a merger of GFG’s upstream and downstream steel manufacturing, mining and distribution businesses around the world (www.libertyhousegroup.com).

Liberty Steel Group will be the eighth-largest steel producer outside China, with operations stretching from Australia to continental Europe, the UK and the USA.

Although the individual businesses will retain a high degree of autonomy, consolidated accounts will be produced, and a united strategy will be developed.

At the heart of the group’s mission will be an ambition to build on GFG’s existing Greensteel strategy and aim for net carbon-neutral status by 2030.

This will involve exploring the best use of new technologies — such as hydrogen generated from renewable power — to produce steel.

Speaking at the recent World Steel Dynamics’ European Conference in Italy, GFG Alliance chairman Sanjeev Gupta said: “We are creating a new force in steel with the size, scale and agility to forge a path towards a sustainable future for our steel businesses and the communities in which we operate.

"Our integrated group will stretch around the world, with a financial and governance structure suitable for an intercontinental business of our size.”