Tata Steel see clear skies for Europe operations in coming years post restructuring, says CEO

Tata Steel's Netherland unit saw production and deliveries were lower in Q3 due to the relining of one of the blast furnaces

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26 Aug, 2025 12:21

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Tata Steel expects to complete the restructuring of its UK operations in the next nine months, which could help the company put a lid on years of losses, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer TV Narendran told Moneycontrol. The recovery in the Netherlands maybe sooner.

"Because of multiple reasons, the financial performance in the Netherlands over the last few quarters has been bad. But now the blast furnace relining is complete. The blast furnace should be back in production next week. And over the next few quarters, we'll go back to the levels that we expect out of Netherlands as far as production is concerned," said Narendran.

For the third quarter, revenue from Europe operations fell 12.5 percent to Rs 18,141.97 crore in the quarter.

The steel major acquired Europe's second-largest steelmaker, Corus, in 2006, however, the deal soon turned out to be an Achilles heel after the 2008 financial crisis, dragging down the Indian parent. With the restructuring efforts, the steel giant expects its bet on Corus to be finally paying off.

Last year, the company announced the elimination of 800 jobs at its under-pressure plant in the Netherlands. On January 19, the company said it would be shutting down the two blast furnaces in its Port Talbot Steelworks in Wales, UK in phases, a move that may affect up to 2,800 jobs even.

"You will see the UK going through a restructuring over the next 9 months or so. And only then will you see the improvement in the operational performance in the UK," Narendran added.

Commenting on the eliminations, Narendran told Reuters that the planned job cuts in Britain were the "least bad option. "

Tata Steel has committed in excess of £130 million to a comprehensive support package for affected employees of the unit at Port Talbot, UK. This is in addition to the £100 million funding for the Transition Board set up by the company along with the UK and Welsh governments.

Narendran said that Netherlands operations would also get a boost with declining energy prices. "Gas prices have dropped, electricity prices have dropped, so, energy costs have come down. So expect to have Netherlands back in positive territory next year," Narendran added.

On a YoY basis, production and deliveries were lower due to the relining of one of the blast furnaces in its Netherlands unit.

“In the Netherlands, traditionally we've been EBITDA-positive, cash-positive, but we've had four or five bad quarters for two reasons. One, we had a cold rolling mill upgrade that we undertook towards the end of the last financial year, which took longer than expected to ramp up; that impacted the product mix,”