Outokumpu

Source: Manufacturing Digital

Date :19/02/2008 09:25:24

Operating in the Thin Strip Business Unit of Outokumpu, one of the world’s foremost stainless steel firms, Sheffield Special Strip is a company that supplies its materials to companies all over the world

Written by Lucy Mowatt and produced by Ben Weaver

Although Sheffield Special Strip was only set up in 1999 through the merger of Avesta Sheffield Precision Strip and Lee Steel Strip, it is a company with a heritage that goes back decades. Since it was founded, the company has seen ownership and strategy changes, with its parent company, Avesta Sheffield, being completely taken over by Outokumpu, a Finnish stainless steel manufacturer in 2002. In spite of the group’s size, owing to the company’s expertise and the specialist nature of the products it manufactures, Sheffield Special Strip is largely left to operate autonomously and arrange its own contracts.

As part of Outokumpu, Sheffield Special Strip fits into the Thin Strip business unit, Andy Lewis, the company’s operations manager explains. He goes on to say, “Within the Thin Strip business, there are three plants; two in Sweden and ourselves, and between us we cover standard, fine and precision product tolerances. So in that respect, within the Thin Strip group, we have a very broad range of qualities and product offering.”

The Sheffield unit is capable of producing strip widths between eight millimetres and 450 millimetres, while they are also able to produce steel with a thickness of between 35 microns and two millimetres. Andy Lewis says that this material has a range of uses in a number of different industries and is “the real crème de la crème” in steel manufacturing. The unit’s products can be used for “anything from the retractor spring that takes your seat belt into its housing down to grab rings for plumbing applications,” Mr Lewis explains, and adds that the metal can also be used in such diverse applications as mobile phone production and in components for ABS braking systems.

Customer specifications

“A lot of our success in the market has developed on the basis that we try to and want to understand the way that our customers process materials,” Andy Lewis says. Indeed, Sheffield Special Strip often works closely with their customers to manufacture material to exacting customer specifications.

Much of the precision strip unit’s raw material is sourced from Outokumpu’s wide strip mills in Sweden and Finland, which can also have added advantages for the customer. Not only does the company have good working relations with Outokumpu’s mills, but it can also involve mill operatives in the initial stages of a contract. “On one particular development last year we actually worked with the technical manager of the melting shop in Sweden and we involved him in the customer meetings,” Andy Lewis says. Customers find that they are reassured that Sheffield Special Strip are dedicated to completely understanding their customers’ needs and products.

Global distribution

Another of Outokumpu’s units in Sheffield is the UK distribution centre, which Sheffield Special Strip has good relationships with. However, Mr. Lewis explains that more often than not the company distributes its own output because of the specialist nature of the product. Not only that, but he says that an efficient service is also behind the decision, saying, “We’re very end user orientated and in fact 90 to 95 percent of what we do is end-user orientated.”

This is in spite of the fact that a large proportion of the unit’s output is exported throughout the world. Around 30 percent is sold in the UK, 40 percent is distributed throughout mainland Europe, while the remainder is shipped to customers around the globe. Mr. Lewis explains that these are largely for long term contracts with customers who go on to process the materials further.

In March 2008 a major reorganisation of Sheffield Special Strip will be completed. Formerly spread across two sites, one in Meadowhall and one in Stocksbridge, the company will, in future, operate just from Meadowhall. This reorganisation will focus the business, reduce costs and allow equipment to be consolidated. As part of that, a number of job roles have been restructured too. Indeed, Mr. Lewis’ previous role as technical manager has now been split between his current role as operations manager and the sales and marketing department. His new responsibilities cover manufacturing, health and safety and quality, while he has passed on customer facing duties to ensure more efficient technical support.

Continuous improvement

This change in facilities has also been accompanied by a process of continuous improvement. The initiative, known as OK1 (OK for Outokumpu, and 1 for the position in the market they intend to occupy), began at Special Strip in January 2006 and the formal programme has another twelve to 18 months to run. This top-led program was rolled out in collaboration with Efeso Consulting, using their World Class Operating Methodologies (WCOM), to ensure that the group attains “production excellence”. As such, each business is holding cross-functional workshops and developing teams called ‘Pillars’ to analyse every area of the business and improve upon results. “In the quality pillar, we’re running teams to improve yield and reduce customer defects.

Another is the health, safety and environment pillar, using the improvement techniques to improve our analysis of injuries, accidents and near misses and working out how to put it right.”

He adds that the company is starting to see the signs of improvement especially now that more people are getting on board because they are being led from CEO level downwards. “The CEO and executive committee are really committed to OK1 and in fact, whenever they visit they will go out and audit the OK1 processes,” he says. By the end of the program he expects that all of the techniques that have been implemented will have become embedded in its processes and be maintained.

The company already holds the ISO 9001 certificate for quality, and the ISO 14001 for environmental processes. Owing to the nature of their industry, Sheffield Special Strip also holds a PPC permit from the Environment Agency. This certificate requires the company to monitor its air and water emissions and as part of OK1 the company is focusing on improving its results. Located near to Junction 34 on the M1, Andy Lewis explains that it may have to work harder to reduce the amount of pollution in the air but adds “it’s a good thing to be challenged.”

Indeed, the company’s intention is to settle into its Meadowhall site going forward and to focus on the challenge of improving all of its processes. The company expects that the site will meet its targets, which will secure ongoing business for the future.

Click here to read the corporate brochure on Outokumpu