1. Team effort wins plate order
CUSTOMER
FOCUSJust days before the Long Products Europe announcement to mothball the plate mills, a combined
effort by several teams saw a prestigiousfinal shipbuilding order being placed.
At the start of October, Sales Manager Mike Nielsen secured an order from Central Industry Group (Centraalstaal) for
plate to build the Baltic, a general cargo vessel for the Abis shipping group, sister to the Indian Daw n built from Tata
Steel’s plate in 2013. Centraalstaal has a long-standing relationship w ith Tata Steel. Through this relationship the
business gained a position of trust w ith around 80% of the steel purchased by Centraalstaal being shotblast and primed
bespoke size plates. Centraalstaal manufacture ‘ready to w eld’ kits to build medium-sized ships such as dredgers,
heavy lift vessels and coastal cargo ships. building ships from kits enables the company to build 20% faster than from
raw plate. This is a highly competitive industry and projects are turned around in a short space of time. The
Centraalstaal facility in Groningen, The Netherlands, relies on the right size plates being available for the components
being processed. This means that if the plate isn’t there the production line stops and so does the customer’s build. This
can lead to astronomical costs of delay, w hich are often passed up the supply chain in claims for damages or delay
penalties. Mike explained: “I w orked w ith representatives from teams across the business to produce a project plan
demonstrating in detail how w e w ould produce and deliver the plates w ith each process from rolling to delivery clearly
scheduled. On the strength of this w e w on the order.”
A pre-production session w as held w here key personnel from all teams w ithin mill operations w ere briefed. Each person
and team knew their part and how it impacted on the w hole order. The emphasis w as on w orking together to solve
issues before they became problems. The team also rose to the challenge from Executive Chairman Longs Steel UK
Limited Bimlendra Jha to look at how to cut costs w ithout impacting customers. “I have to thank the team w orking on
this order,” said Kathleen Gannon,
Transport Planner at Scunthorpe Plate Mill. “Our figures show that w e improved trailer loads by 2.94 tonnes per trailer,
w hich translates to a saving of more than £17,600 across the project. This show s w e can save money and serve the
customer, every plate arrived on time in Groningen.”
Indian Dawn, the sister ship to the new Abisvessel
Special thanks to:
 Debbie Taylor,MasterScheduler
 JohnBurnham, Rick Boulton andGemmaHarveyfrom SupplyChain
 Mark CunninghamandIan
SimpsonfromScunthorpe Plate Mill
 DeanAtkinsonfromShotblastPlant
 KathleenGannonandMalcolmMillerfromTransport
 Estelle GoodsonfromCustomerServices