Tokai Carbon GE LLC, a manufacturer of graphite electrodes for the U.S. steel industry, plans to create up to 15 full-time jobs with a $25 million investment in its facility in Hickman, Ky. The investment would cover the cost to install new equipment, which will allow the company to increase production to better serve customers throughout the U.S. Tokai Carbon GE LLC is a subsidiary of Tokai Carbon Co., which is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. Tokai Carbon purchased the U.S.-based graphite electrode business of SGL Carbon in November 2017 and operates production facilities in Hickman and Ozark, Ark. The Tokai Carbon Hickman site currently employs 50 people.

HarbisonWalker International (HWI), a supplier of refractory products and services, completed the first phase of a $9 million expansion at its manufacturing operations in White Cloud, Mich. The project will significantly increase warehousing space and add advanced-manufacturing and hydraulic press technologies. HWI’s 110,000-square-foot White Cloud facility currently employs approximately 140 people and produces brick and monolithic refractories utilized by the steel industry.

Despite its history and ubiquitous presence as an infrastructure material, steels remain a complex material system with many persisting research questions.

Improvements in steel manufacturing processes have yielded advancements in the purity of steel that, in turn, yield higher-quality end-use products.

Tata Steel and thyssenkrupp AG signed a definitive agreement to create a new company by combining their European steel businesses in a 50/50 joint venture. This follows the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding in September 2017. The proposed new company, to be named thyssenkrupp Tata Steel B.V., will be positioned as a leading pan-European high-quality flat-steel producer. The joint venture will be managed as one integrated business through a holding company headquartered in the Amsterdam region of the Netherlands.