Nippon Steel Regains Top H-Beam Production Share in F2009

Nippon Steel regained top domestic share for H-beam production in fiscal 2009 ended March 2010 when the national output decreased by 22.5% to 3.124 million tonnes from fiscal 2008. Nippon Steel, which was behind Tokyo Steel Manufacturing in fiscal 2008, increased the production to follow growing offshore demand. Nippon Steel and Topy Industries increased the output while other makers reduced the output under severe domestic market.

Nippon Steel increased the output by 4.9% to 770,655 tonnes in fiscal 2009 from fiscal 2008. The production share increased by 6.5 percentage points to 24.7%. Tokyo Steel, which halved the output to 659,456 tonnes, decreased the share by 12.5 points to 21.1%.

The positions in share ranking for other makers than the top 2 makers were same in fiscal 2009 as fiscal 2008. The number 3 maker of JFE Steel, which decreased the output by 21.8% to 488,515 tonnes from fiscal 2008, kept the production share. The number 4 maker of Sumitomo Metal Industries, which reduced the output by 3.7% to 482,367 tonnes, increased the share by 3.0 points to 15.4%.

The fifth maker of Yamato Steel increased the production share by 1.6 points to 15.4% in fiscal 2009 from fiscal 2008 while the production decreased by 11.4% to 383,527 tonnes. The sixth maker of Topy Industries increased the output by 9.9% to 174,884 tonnes increasing the share by 1.6 point.