MOSCOW — Novolipetsk Steel said Wednesday that it agreed to buy John Maneely Company, the United States’ largest independent steel pipe and tube manufacturer, for $3.5 billion in the biggest North American purchase ever by a Russian metals company.
Novolipetsk, also known as NLMK, said it would acquire 100 percent of JMC from Carlyle Group, the world’s second-largest private-equity firm, and the Zekelman family, as Russia’s metals giants continue to buy up the continent’s steel assets.
The deal, which is to be approved by the U.S. Committee on Foreign Investment, is expected to be closed in the fourth quarter of 2008 and create synergies worth $35 million per year, NLMK said in a statement on its web site.
“We are delighted to have secured entry into the highly attractive U.S. pipe and tube market,” NLMK chairman Vladimir Lisin, who owns an 85 percent stake in the company, said in the statement.
JMC produces pipes and tubes used in construction, infrastructure and utilities at its 11 plants in the United States and Canada. For the 12 months ending June 30, it shipped 2.1 million tons of pipe and had earnings before interest, taxes, debt and amortization of $485 million.
“The acquisition of JMC fits with NLMK’s stated strategy of portfolio diversification and downstream integration in the core markets of the company. It strengthens NLMK’s position in North America and provides an entry point into an important and high-margin end market,” the statement said...
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