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Canadian steel producer to invest $50 million in Arkansas plant, hire 100 workers Saturday, Oct 15, 2005 By Wesley Brown Arkansas News Bureau LITTLE ROCK - A Canadian tubing company said Friday that it will invest $50 million to build a steel tubing manufacturing plant in Blytheville, home of the state's thriving steel industry. Atlas Tube Inc., the largest maker of hollow structural tubes, said construction on a new 450,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art plant will begin immediately. More than 100 workers will be hired at the Mississippi County plant, which will begin production in the third quarter of 2006 and be fully operational by the end of 2006. Gov. Mike Huckabee praised Atlas for choosing eastern Arkansas to locate its new manufacturing facility. "The technology that Atlas Tube uses is cutting edge and sets a standard within the industry," the governor said. "We look forward to a long, prosperous relationship." The Canadian tubing giant, whose U.S. headquarters are located in Plymouth, Mich., said its structural tubing products have been used in construction of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, the Kennedy Space Center's Apollo Center and Las Vegas' Light Screen over Fremont Street. In July, Atlas bought the structural tubing products line of St. Louis-based Maverick Tube Corp. for $37.8 million. That deal included an agreement that allows Maverick to continue to produce products for up to 18 months for Atlas Tube at its mill in Hickman, just outside Blytheville. A month later, Atlas agreed to buy all of the shares of Copperweld Holding Co. of Pittsburgh for $350 million. As part of that deal, Atlas then sold Copperweld's mechanical tube and auto parts plants in Shelby, Ohio; Elizabethtown, Ky., and at three sites in Canada to Ontario-based Dofasco Inc. for $177.8 million. All of those transactions were completed last week. Atlas will now will have a combined annual capacity in excess of 1.5 million tons per year at its Canadian plants in Harrow, Ontario, and Winnepeg, Manitoba, and its U.S. facilities in Plymouth, Chicago and Blytheville. The Arkansas plant will house a 70,000-pound wall slitter and be capable of producing steel tubing ranging in size from 2 inches to 16 inches in diameter. The Atlas facility will be located near two large steel mills owned by Nucor Corp., the nation's second-largest steel producer. Nucor manufacturers flat-rolled steel for appliances, pipes and tubes, construction, automotive and other industries. Currently, Nucor's two steel recycling mills along the Mississippi River support more than 30 steel suppliers and customers in the town that employ more than 4,000 workers, according to state labor statistics. Mainly on the strength of Blytheville's steel industry, Arkansas is the seventh-largest steel-producing state in the nation. Although Atlas or state economic development officials did not provide any information about incentives and the pay scale of the new jobs, wages for steel workers in Mississippi County are on average $913.34 a week, labor statistics show. "We're very excited about being in Blytheville and building a world-class facility next to Nucor Steel. This location, combined with our other plants, strategically positions Atlas Tube to better serve the entire North American (tubing) market," Atlas Tubing CEO Barry Zekelman said in a statement. "Local and state authorities made it an easy decision to locate in Arkansas." Blytheville Mayor Barrett Harrison said the Atlas announcement will put the city and county over 1,000 jobs created during the last three years. "This was a group effort between the city, county, state and the Great River Economic Development Area," Harrison said. "These four groups worked hard to make sure Atlas Tube had what they needed to locate in Mississippi County." |
