• Korean Management Science Review
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.45-59
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• 2003

This study considers the local players in the European steel industry, whose the amounts of crude production are more or less 5 million tons per annum. They do not belong to the Pan-EU mega-group of steel mills with more than 15 million tons of crude production yearly. However, these mid-sized steel mills in European countries have been originated from the strong foundation of steel, scientifically and technically, as well as the centennial history. They concentrate on the niche market adjacent to the local area, which takes advantage of the geographical location. The companies considered here are VoestAlpine in Austria, Salzgitter in Germany, Rautaruukki in finland, and SSAB in Sweden. Their corporate strategies are compared on the basis of product mix and sales structure. And, the deep analysis for each company is performed, such as business strategies with the sales volumes, market strategies. competitiveness improvement planning. and R&D policies with the technology management. These analysis results can be benchmarked as the cases of best practices for domestic steel mills, especially mid & small sized companies, that develop business and market strategies for the sustainable growth and profitability.

• International Journal of Korean Welding Society
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.7-13
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• 2002

A comparison of the welding performance of ship hull structural steels has been made. The weldability of steels especially designed for laser processing was compared to that of conventional hull and structural steels with plate thicknesses up to 12 mm. Autogenous laser beam welding was used to weld butt joints as well as skid and stake welded T-joints. The welds were assessed in accordance with the document "The Classification Societies" Requirements for Approval of $CO_2$ Laser Welding Procedures" Small imperfections in the weld only grew slightly in root bend tests and they only had a minor influence on the fatigue properties of laser fillet welded joints. In Charpy impact tests, the 27 J transition temperature of the weld metal and HAZ ranged from below -60 to $-50^{\circ}C$. The amount of martensite in the weld metal depended on the carbon equivalent of the steel with the highest amounts and highest hardness levels in conventional EH 36 (389 HV 5). Thermomechanically rolled steels contained less martensite and showed a correspondingly lower maximum hardness.ximum hardness.