December 12, 2018, 23:43 / Business Exclusively by subscription

Severstal opens an innovation center

Technopark in Cherepovets will help the development of technology startups Polina Trifonova Before the end of December, the company will officially launch a new experimental site on the basis of the Cherepovets Metallurgical Plant / Vladimir Smirnov / TASS

By the end of December, the company will officially launch a new experimental site on the basis of the Cherepovets Metallurgical Plant, a Severstal representative told Vedomosti. The technology park will be a full-fledged production center with the ability to conduct the entire cycle of testing new prototypes and technologies. “It will be possible to smelt up to 250 kg of raw materials, hot and cold rolling of prototypes, heat treatment, and do all the necessary experiments and tests,” said a company representative. The goal of the project is to accelerate the development of new types of products, he explained. A company representative declined to name the amount of investment in the project.

The technology park’s capabilities will not be limited to testing Severstal’s own technologies. The company expects that the platform will interest third-party developers with its capabilities. These can be either existing industrial enterprises or startups, says a company representative. “In addition to providing research and material and technical base for testing and implementing developments, Severstal will provide assistance in searching for patents and protecting intellectual property,” says a company representative. To gain access to the technology park, you will need to submit an application describing the project, which will be analyzed by Severstal experts, he explains. If the company considers the project or idea promising, it will offer possible options for cooperation. The main condition is that the project must correspond to the company’s specialization.

Severstal will spend half a billion on new facades of the plant in Cherepovets

The design was developed by Artemy Lebedev's studio

“Joint work within the technology park will allow the company to generate innovative ideas and improve existing approaches and proposals,” emphasized the company’s general director Alexander Shevelev (his words were conveyed to Vedomosti by a company representative).

Increased investment in the development of new technologies is part of the company's new strategy. In the spring , Severstal announced the creation of the Severstal Ventures division. Its mission is to invest worldwide in funds and projects specializing in innovative projects in the field of advanced materials. The company has already invested in two similar projects in the Netherlands: Pangea Ventures and Chrysalix Robo Valley. Severstal did not disclose the amount of investment in these specific funds. Severstal's investment in Chrysalix Robo Valley amounted to about $10 million, a person close to one of the parties to the deal told Vedomosti. In general, Severstal Ventures will invest up to $20–25 million a year in projects, Shevelev said in an interview with Vedomosti. The new project in Cherepovets will be focused on Russian developers. The company representative does not specify whether there is any limit on the amount of investment in attracted projects.

The technology park itself was hardly worth much for the company, says Maxim Khudalov, director of the ACRA corporate ratings group. According to his calculations, the cost of its construction amounted to about 300 million rubles. “For now, the company will mainly invest in the technology park,” says Khudalov. “These investments will begin to pay off in 4–5 years.” The economic effect in the future can be very significant, the expert emphasizes. “A new material or alloy, entering a new product niche, improving equipment. Investments in R&D do not produce an immediate effect, but when it manifests itself, the results can be very positive,” he lists. If new developments make it possible to reduce the company’s costs by even 1%, this will already save the company about 2.7 billion rubles, Khudalov emphasizes.

Earlier on the topic: Severstal revealed a new strategy for the next five years

Severstal's direct competitors, NLMK and MMK , are also investing in new developments. The economic effect obtained by NLMK thanks to the introduction of new modeling and data analysis systems will amount to about 200 million rubles, the company’s director for mathematical modeling and data analysis, Andrzej Arshavsky, estimated in winter (from an interview with TAdviser). As an example, Arshavsky cited a new system for monitoring the consumption of ferroalloys. In addition, in 2017, NLMK, together with the German SAP, created its own innovation laboratory. In 2018, MMK created its own development center on the basis of Magnitogorsk State Technical University. University graduates are engaged in scientific and experimental work, developing innovative technologies for industrial enterprises, said a representative of MMK. One of these is exoskeletons for coke production, he gave an example: the solution still remains at the level of an idea; it is being actively developed for use in production.

“Today, more and more materials are appearing that can compete with steel on equal terms, and in some respects surpass it,” says Khudalov. The steel industry is designed to produce large volumes of standard products and is still poorly adapted to innovation. The opening of technology parks by companies in the steel industry is an attempt to monitor new products and quickly respond to their emergence, he argues.