July 2006 — Posco recently started up a new continuous galvanizing line at the Gwangyang Works.

The new line — 6CGL — will be capable of producing about 400,000 tons of zinc-plated steel plates per year by stably plating cold-rolled steel plates. It is expected that 6CGL will greatly contribute to Posco’s success in the high-quality automotive steel plates market, for which demand continues to increase.

Posco is now capable of producing up to 6,500,000 tons of automotive steel plates, including 2,100,000 tons of high-quality zinc-plated automotive steel plates, and is the world’s second largest automotive steel plate producer after Arcelor.

Posco has actively invested in its high value-added items since the late 1990s to compete with large-scale and integrated multinational steel corporations and fast-growing steelmakers in China or other developing countries. To make Gwangyang Works the world’s best automotive steel plate plant, the steelmaker established four cold-rolling plants with about 2,200,000 tons of capacity a year in 1997, which were followed by the installation of 4CGL in 2000 and 5CGL in 2005.

In addition, Posco will invest KRW 1.6 trillion to upgrade its existing automotive steel plate production facility by 2008 to support its high-quality automotive steel plate production and the development of Korea’s motor companies. To globalize Korea’s motor companies, Posco will work with motor companies for every stage of automotive steel plate production to develop and supply new steel plates faster than competitors and stably support technologies and materials to Korea-based automotive parts suppliers abroad. Posco will also strengthen its technological cooperation with leading automotive makers in Japan, the U.S. and Europe to consolidate its reputation as the global automotive steel plate supplier.

For this purpose, Posco says it will expand its automotive steel plate production base abroad and establish a global service system.