Greensill collapse in 2021 doesn't deter Sanjeev Gupta's green steel aim for Whyalla works, South Australia
Sanjeev Gupta remaimed committed to his green steel vision for the Whyalla steelworks on South Australis Spencer Gulf that he bought in 2017 to become part of his international company.
Images courtesy Channel 9 News Adelaide
Billionaire Sanjeev Gupta fought off financial threats to his international company Liberty Steel Group – including his 2017 purchase of the steel plant at Whyalla on South Australia’s Spencer Gulf – in 2021, after the collapse of lender Greensill Capital.
Gupta’s Liberty Steel Group reached an agreement in principle to restructure its Greensill-related debt of up to $4 billion to creditors including Credit Suisse. The collapse of Greensill Capital in 2021 raised fears over the future of GFG Alliance, an informal collection of companies owned by Gupta, said to employ 35,000 people across the world. Gupta also cemented a deal to refinance the Whyalla steelworks and Tahmoor coal operations in New South Wales, both under his Liberty Primary Metals Australia entity. In 2019, Gupta had consolidated all his global steel businesses to form Liberty Steel Group, aiming to be the world's first carbon neutral company through a green steel strategy by 2030.
Gutpta bought the then-insolvent Whyalla steelworks and mining business — the city’s main employer— in 2017 with a green steel vision to transform it with $1 billion upgrades. In 2019, he commissioned a major cost-cutting exercise at the "financially challenged" Whyalla steelworks. An international team of experts was brought to make "major cost reductions" that would help sustain the steelworks until 2023 when the planned upgrades were due to be ready.
Guptpa said that, despite the major improvements already achieved, the Whyalla works — “especially when faced with the additional impact from Covid-19 — remains financially challenged”.
The Australian Workers' Union welcomed Gupta's guarantee about jobs and was confident that efficiencies could be found without cutting workers' pay or job numbers. Union representative Peter Lamps said that, while there were concerns among its members, “the lay of the land is different” from when the previous steelworks owner Arrium collapsed: “Whyalla steelworks is a profitable and well-run business in 2021. Our workers are focused on making quality Australian steel, going with the broad consensus on its profitability and viability”.
Both the South Australian and Australian offered assistance if needed but state premier Steven Marshall believed the Whyalla operations could “stand on their own two feet” as a viable business because the order book was full, productivity had increased and suppliers were getting paid in increasingly shorter time frames. State government treasurer Rob Lucas reiterated that the difference from Arium in 2016 was “that the mines make a lot of money, the steelworks is in the black, its audit books are full."
Gupta also announced a latest version of its steelworks upgrade plans and that the company was pushing "towards financial viability of our current operations" to achieve its long-term aim of developing a "sustainable, world-class, carbon-neutral steelworks at Whyalla". The new plans included an electric arc furnace and a direct reduced iron system that Gupta said would help his company become the "world's largest carbon-neutral steel producer by 2030. South Australia, in particular, has one of the largest deposits of magnetite ore, and some of the best conditions for renewable energy”.
In October 2024, it was reported that Sanjeev Gupta was being prosecuted by Companies House in the United Kingdom for failing to file accounts for 76 companies listed in Britain, including Liberty Commodities. Gupta pleaded not guilty,
