| Ovako AB | |
| Foundation: | 2005 |
| Location: | Stockholm, Sweden |
| Area Served: | Worldwide |
| Key People: | Marcus Hedblom (President and CEO) Mr Katsuhiro Miyamoto (Chairman of the Board) |
| Type: | Limited company |
| Industry: | Steel |
| Products: | Steel products, bars, tubes and rings |
| Brands: | BQ-Steel® IQ-Steel® M-Steel® WR-Steel® SZ-Steel® |
| Revenue: | € 921 million (2017) |
| Operating Income: | € 69 million (2017) |
| Net Income: | € 15 million (2017) |
| Owner: | Nippon Steel Corporation |
| Num Employees: | 2900 (March 2024) |
| Parent: | Nippon Steel Corporation |
| Subsid: | Ovako Hallstahammar AB Ovako Sweden AB Ovako Imatra Oy Ab Ovako Molinella S.p.A. Ovako Redon SAS Ovako Bar AB Ovako Steel Marketing Ovako BeNeLux Ovako Special Steel Trading Co. Ltd. Ovako Balkans, Greece and Cyprus Ovako GmbH Ovako Sales Unit Scandinavia Ovako Metals Oy Ab Ovako France S.A.S Ovako North America Inc. Ovako Polska Sp.z o.o Ovako Ltd. |
Ovako AB is a European manufacturer of engineering steel for customers e.g. in the bearing, transportation and manufacturing industries. Since 2018, Ovako has been owned by Nippon Steel Corporation.[1]
The production is based on recycled steel scrap and includes steel in the form of bar, tube, ring and pre-components. Ovako is one of the world's largest manufacturers of seamless tubes for the bearing industry.[2]
Ovako produces bars, tubes, rings and pre-components. Ovako also produces steels for mining, rock drilling and construction applications.[3] The company has 9 production sites in Sweden, Finland, the Netherlands, Germany and Italy, and several sales companies in Europe, Asia and the United States.
Ovako steel is made from recycled steel scrap that is then refined and transformed into products such as hot-rolled or cold-rolled bars with various profiles and forms of processing, tubes, rings and pre-components.
Ovako's customers are primarily the European engineering industry and its subcontractors, for example makers of trucks, contracting plant and industrial applications, the mining industry and the wind power industry. The majority of Ovako's products are sold to customers in Europe but steel is also exported to North America and Asia.
The number of employees is 2 900 (March 2024). Operations are divided into three business areas: Hofors-Hällefors, Smedjebacken-Boxholm and Imatra.
Marcus Hedblom has been CEO of Ovako since 2015. The chairman of Ovako's board of directors is Mr Katsuhiro Miyamoto.
Ovako operates on the market for long, low alloy steel products. The majority of production consists of bars, tubes and rings that are used in items such as ball bearings, products for the automotive industry, hydraulic cylinders and rock drills.
Ovako specialises in steel with a high degree of purity and low oxygen content, steel with improved machining properties and boron steel with high abrasion resistance. Ovako is Europe's biggest manufacturer of piston rods for the hydraulics industry via its CROMAX group of companies. These are low carbon, hard chromium-plated rods of high-strength steel.
Ovako has 8 production sites: Boxholm, Hallstahammar, Hofors,[4] [5] Hällefors and Smedjebacken in Sweden, Imatra in Finland, Molinella in Italy and Redon in France. The company also has sales offices in a number of countries worldwide.
Ovako's production is a further development of some of the ironworks set up in Sweden in the 17th and 18th centuries in places such as Hofors, Boxholm and Hällefors. The ironworks gradually grew into major industrial centers and subsequently belonged to the companies that merged to form Ovako today.
In 1969, the Finnish steel companies Oy Vuoksenniska Ab and Oy Fiskars Ab formed a joint company: Ovako. In 1972, Wärtsilä became a shareholder in the company.
In 1986, Ovako Steel was formed via a merger of SKF Steel and Ovako. In 1991, SKF became sole owner of Ovako Steel, while operations in Imatra continued under the name Imatra Steel. In the same year, Fundia was acquired by Rautaruukki Oy and Norsk Jern Holding A/S.
In 2010, Ovako was sold to Triton, which took over everything except the wire rod division from the company.
In 2018 Ovako was sold to Nippon Steel.