Tycoons reaches for the sky

The plant will play a key role in helping produce steel products to fuel Vietnam’s construction boom

With an estimated capitalised fund of $1.04 billion, the Dung Quat steel factory is set to produce five million tonnes of billets per stable production year, almost double Vietnam’s domestic demand for billets, the material required to make long steel products, including wide rods and deformed bars.
The first phase of the project to produce two million tonnes of billets is scheduled to start before the third quarter of this year and be completed by early 2009 – the scheduled date for the opening of Vietnam’s first oil-refinery.
Tycoons has contracted Jigang Iron & Steel Group, the eighth-largest steel firm in China, to build the Dung Quat steel factory in the form of a turn-key contract.
Although industrial analysts from the Vietnam Steel Association still have doubts about the viability of the Tycoons factory due to the relatively huge investment capital required, the Dung Quat Economic Zone Authority greatly hopes the project will contribute to making Dung Quat a heavy industrial centre.
The authority’s senior official Le Van Dung told Vietnam Investment Review that the authority had pledged to clear the factory site in June to ensure the Dung Quat steel development plan would be met.
“It is undeniable that once operational, the Dung Quat steel factory will help reduce Vietnam’s over-reliance on foreign billets. For the Dung Quat Economic Zone, the project is likely to open good opportunities for other Taiwanese and Korean heavy industrial investors to come to the zone,” he said.
As one of the country’s fast-developing economic zones, Dung Quat covers 13,000 hectares in Quang Nam and Quang Ngai provinces in central Vietnam. It is close to National Highway 1A and the north-south railway network. It also has a seaport 90km from an international sea route and Chu Lai Airport is located only 15 kilometres away – all attractive elements for prospective investors.
Dung said Dung Quat’s complete infrastructure and transparent investment procedures are drawing a variety of heavy industrial investors including China’s Baotou Iron and Steel Industry Engineering and Research Corporation, China Mineral Group, Taiwan’s E United and Korea’s Doosan.
Tycoons Worldwide Group is a subsidiary of Tycoons Group International, also known as Taiwan Steel. The group has been operating screw-making factories in Taiwan, Thailand and China and is building a similar factory in My Xuan Industrial Park in southern Ba Ria-Vung Tau province.