ArcelorMittal

ArcelorMittal, steelmaking company that, when formed from the merger of the Arcelor and Mittal steel companies in 2006, was the world’s largest. Its headquarters are in Luxembourg city.

Arcelor’s roots were in the Luxembourgian company Aciéries Réunies de Burbach-Eich-Dudelange (ARBED SA), which was formed in 1911 through the merger of Les Forges d’Eich, Le Gallais, Metz et Cie. (established in 1838 under a different name); La Société Anonyme des Mines du Luxembourg et Forges de Sarrebruck (1856); and La Société Anonyme des Hauts Fourneaux et Forges de Dudelange (1882). Through its subsidiaries and affiliate companies, ARBED SA engaged in every step of steel production and processing, from the extraction of coal and iron ore (from its own mines) to the fabrication of highly specialized steel products, including the whole range of rolled-steel products and some finished products, especially wire. By the end of the 1970s ARBED SA was the sole remaining steelmaker in Luxembourg, with the government holding about one-third of its ownership. In 1980 it entered into a joint venture with Bethlehem Steel Corporation, an American steel company, to produce Galvalume, a sheet steel product patented by Bethlehem, for distribution to Europe and abroad. In the 1990s ARBED SA became increasingly involved in electronic commerce. In 2001 it merged with the Spanish company Aceralia and the French company Usinor to form Arcelor.

Mittal Steel was founded in Indonesia in 1976 by Lakshmi Mittal, an Indian whose father operated a steel mill in Calcutta in the 1960s. In 1989 Mittal purchased the troubled state-owned steelworks in Trinidad and Tobago, and a year later that facility had doubled its output and become profitable. He used a similar formula for success in numerous acquisitions around the world, purchasing failing (mostly state-run) outfits and sending in special management teams to reorganize the businesses.

In 2006 Mittal’s attempts at a hostile takeover of Arcelor were initially blocked by the Luxembourgian government, which relented before year’s end, allowing the merger of the two companies as ArcelorMittal. Although the government then divested itself of much of its ownership of the company, it maintained a small interest in ArcelorMittal, of which Lakshmi Mittal became chief executive officer.