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SMS Group Donation to Help Quake Victims in China
05/22/2008 - SMS group donates EUR 100,000 to the Red Cross Society of China to help the earthquake victims in the Sichuan Province in central China.
SMS group, Germany, is donating EUR 100,000 to the Red Cross Society of China. The money will go to help the earthquake victims in Sichuan Province, central China.
The SMS group supplied its first rolling mill to China clear back in 1904, and it has been involved through the ensuing decades in building and expanding the Chinese steel industry.
When the earthquake hit, eight SMS group employees were near the center of the disaster zone. They were in China to supervise work for Chinese customers. Luckily, none were hurt, and directly after the first tremors they were evacuated to Shanghai, Changzu, Nanjing, and Maanshan. Once in safety, they gave first-hand accounts of the devastating extent of the damage and the huge suffering of the local population.
“Here at our company,” says Dr. Heinrich Weiss, Chairman of the SMS group, “we immediately felt the urge to send effective help. There was a wave of sympathy among our employees, especially as lots of them know the country from assignments at our Chinese customers. That’s why we contacted the Chinese embassy and asked how we could help. Then we decided to support the rescue operation with a donation to the Chinese Red Cross.”
SMS GmbH is the holding of a group of companies internationally active in plant construction and mechanical engineering for the steel and nonferrous metals industry. It consists of the two Business Areas SMS Demag and SMS Meer, which jointly form SMS metallurgy. In 2007, some 8000 employees worldwide generated a turnover of about EUR 3.0 billion.
