Dillinger Hütte

Dillinger Hütte is a steel producer in Dillingen, in the German Federal State of Saarland, and has a history stretching back more than three hundred years. The plant was founded in 1685, and was Germany's first Aktiengesellschaft, or (1809). The first continuous-caster for slabs in the world was commissioned in Dillingen in 1962. A further machine, permitting casting of slabs of up to 400 mm in thickness - the thickest produced anywhere in the world at that time - was added, along with other new facilities, in 1998. In 2010, Dillinger Hütte successfully produced the first 450 mm thick slab - another world record. The principal equipment in the rolling mill now takes the form of two four-high stands, of which one is currently the largest in the world, with an effective rolling width of 5.5 m and a rolling pressure of 110 MN.

The Dillinger Hütte group also includes a further rolling mill operated by GTS Industries in Dunkirk (France). The group's parent company is DHS Holding, which owns 95.28% of the shares in the operating company, AG der Dillinger Hütte. Another 4.72% are held in free float. The company's products are marketed under the Dillinger Hütte GTS trade name.

The shares in DHS Holding are owned 33.4% by the international Arcelor Mittal steel group, with 33.75% held by Saarstahl AG and 15.00% by Struktur-Holding-Stahl. Reciprocal part-ownership exists with Saarstahl AG, in which Dillinger Hütte holds 25.10%. Dillinger Hütte also owns 50% of the ROGESA Roheisengesellschaft iron smelting company, whose blast furnaces, located on the Dillinger Hütte plant site, produce inter alia the "hot metal" (liquid pig iron) required for steel production. ROGESA itself also has a stake in the ZKS Zentralkokerei Saar coking-plant operator, the facilities of which also form part of the Dillinger Hütte site.

Dillinger Hütte produces heavy steel plate, cast slag pots and semi-finished products, such as pressings, and (pressure) vessel heads and shell sections. Total production when the French subsidiary, GTS Industries, is included is well over two million tonnes of heavy plate annually, in a thickness range extending from 6 to 440 mm, making the company Europe's largest heavy plate producer. This robust material is used for fabrication of drilling rigs, ships, petrochemicals plants, bridges and heavy machinery; reference projects include the Öresund Bridge and the Millau Viaduct, the Moses Mabhida Stadium in Durban, and the luxury liner, Queen Mary 2. The striking arc of the Olympic Stadium in Athens was also welded from plate supplied by Dillinger Hütte. The main application for Dillinger Hütte's heavy plate output, however, is the making of large-caliber line pipe for major pipeline projects. The so-called thermomechanical rolling process, an extremely sophisticated rolling method which permits attainment of maximized mechanical properties combined with optimum working (bending and welding) characteristics, is used for these products. Dillinger Hütte is also a 50% owner of Europipe GmbH, Europe's largest manufacturer of large-caliber line pipe, with facilities in Germany, France and the USA.