In an announcement, Liberty House said it is buying ArcelorMittal’s integrated steel works at Galati in Romania and Ostrava in the Czech Republic, along with rolling mills at Skopje in Macedonia and Piombino in Italy.

ArcelorMittal is divesting those assets and others in order to satisfy an agreement with European competition regulators, who had raised concerns about its planned acquisition of Italian steelmaker ILVA.    

According to Liberty House, the four plants have a combined rolling capacity of about 8 million metric tons and produce a broad range of finished products, including plate, hot- and cold-rolled coils, galvanized sheet, tinplate, bar, wire rod, and rail. The company said the plants serve both domestic and European Union markets. 

“At a stroke, these acquisitions would almost double the size of our workforce and global production capacity, giving us a strong presence in the heart of Europe’s key manufacturing regions,” said Liberty House founder Sanjeev Gupta. 

“We intend to work with local partners to position ourselves strongly within the domestic supply chains of these fast-expanding national economies and become a pivotal part of a thriving European industrial sector. These are high-quality assets with highly-skilled staff.” 

The deal is conditional on ArcelorMittal completing its acquisition of ILVA. ArcelorMittal has said it expects to close on 1 November.

Meanwhile, it is continuing to negotiate a sale of other assets that are part of its divestment agreement, ArcelorMittal Dudelange in Luxembourg, and several finishing lines in Liege, Belgium.