Sumitomo Metals and Sumitomo Corp Buy Norton Manufacturing in USA

Sumitomo Metal Industries and Sumitomo Corporation announced on Friday they reached an agreement to acquire Norton Manufacturing Company which is crankshaft processing maker in USA. Sumitomo group will start crankshaft machining in USA including lathe turning, grind and heat treating processes. Sumitomo Metals and Sumitomo Corp paid about US$ 50 million or about 5.7 billion yen for the acquirement. They will supply continual production system from material production to machining process for the users such as automakers in USA. The acquisition will be closed at the end of 2008.Automakers in North America tend to contract workout machinery processing for cost reduction. Sumitomo Metals increases production capacity of crankshaft to 2.95 million units per year until 2009 from current 1.5 million units in North America by the acquisition of Norton.Sumitomo Metals has exported crankshaft for automobile from Osaka Steel Works in Osaka, Japan to North America or produced at International Crankshaft, a joint company with Sumitomo Corporation in USA. However, Sumitomo Metals don’t have the function of machining process in USA.