OREANDA-NEWS. In line with a long-term contract, the Novolipetsk Steel Group (LSE: NLMK), Russia's largest steel manufacturer, has delivered over one million tons of uninterrupted casted steel slabs to OMK since 2012. OMK (United Metallurgical Company, OMK CJSC, based in Moscow) is the leader of Russia's LDPs market and will use the slabs to produce thick-sheet, high-durability rolled metal at the new Heavy Plate Mill 5000 at Vyksa Steel Works (part of OMK) for large diameter pipes. This was announced at a business meeting between Oleg Bagrin, President of NLMK Group, and Vladimir Markin, President of OMK Group, which took place at Novolipetsk Steel on June 20, 2014.

The contract between NLMK and OMK was signed in August of 2012. In November of 2013, the companies signed a Long-Term Cooperation agreement, under which Novolipetsk Steel will deliver over 2 million tons of slabs, with extra requirements as to chemical composition, metal structure and dimensions unique to Russia, to Vyksa Steel Works from 2014 through 2016.

“The cooperation between NLMK and OMK plays an important role in providing domestic consumers with high-quality steel products. The nearly two years of our successful cooperation have proven the effectiveness and feasibility of the Russian hi-tech LDP production chain: from ore extraction and steelmaking to the end product, that production chain has laid a solid foundation for our further successful cooperation,” said Oleg Bagrin, President of NLMK Group.

“The effective technological scheme of extracting ore to making LDPs, which is successfully operating in central Russia thanks to OMK's state-of-the-art facilities for producing wide sheets and pipes, and thanks to our partnership with the NLMK Group, makes it possible for us to steadily reduce pipe sheet imports and ensure continuous high quality through walkthrough control of all the production stages. The certification of our sheets (made from Lipetsk slabs), which are to be used for the second branch of the offshore South Stream pipeline, is currently on the agenda. We expect that this will enable us to stop purchasing sheets with superior characteristics from abroad and will considerably benefit the Russian budget,” said Vladimir Markin, President of OMK Group.