European Steel Company Histories

Europe is where the modern steel industry began. Henry Bessemer’s converter (1856), the Siemens-Martin open-hearth furnace and the Gilchrist-Thomas basic process (1879) were all developed here. The Thomas process unlocked the phosphoric ores of Lorraine and Luxembourg and helped make the Ruhr, Belgium and the Saar into the industrial heartlands of the 20th century.

Steel also shaped Europe politically. The European Coal and Steel Community of 1951 placed the French and German steel industries under common control and became the foundation of today’s European Union. After decades of state ownership, the industry was privatised and consolidated. The British Steel Corporation was privatised in 1988 and merged with Hoogovens in 1999 to form Corus, which Tata Steel acquired in 2007. On the Continent, Usinor, Arbed and Aceralia merged to form Arcelor in 2002, which Mittal Steel took over in 2006.

Alongside the integrated giants, family-owned electric arc furnace groups such as Riva in Italy and Celsa in Spain built large businesses in long products and special steels. Today the European industry faces high energy costs, import competition and the need to decarbonise, with blast furnaces being replaced by EAF and hydrogen-based routes. The histories below trace how each company reached its current position.