Dofasco
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Dofasco an Arcelor company, is a steel company based in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, as is longtime rival Stelco. It is the 57th world steel company with an annual output of 4,4 millions tons. In January 2006, Luxembourg-based company Arcelor, 2nd world steel company behind Mittal Steel, offered 71 dollar per share, winning the bid against ThyssenKrupp, 10th world steel company, which also tried to buy back Dofasco.
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[edit] Operations
It was incorporated as Dominion Steel Castings Company Limited in 1912, becoming Dominion Foundries and Steel Company in 1917. Its longtime nickname was adopted legally in 1980. Dofasco owned and operated National Steel Car, a Hamilton-based railway freight car manufacturer, between 1962 and 1994. Additionally, it owned Algoma Steel from 1988 through 1991, until union and financial difficulties at this subsidiary caused Dofasco to abandon ownership.
Dofasco is one of the most successful steel companies in the world, especially with its four electrically powered recycling mini-mills. It has won several awards for being the most sustainable manufacturing company in North America. During the recession of the early 1990s, Dofasco was buffetted by the changing fortunes of the market and made its first permanent layoffs since the Great Depression of the 1930s.
A Luxembourg-based company, Arcelor, made a takeover bid for Dofasco in November 2005, thereby setting off an international auction, in which Arcelor found itself bidding against ThyssenKrupp. Dofasco's board supported ThyssenKrupp, a German concern. As of 4 January 2006, both parties offered $63 Canadian dollar per share. As of 24 January 2006, Arcelor's final bid of C$71 dollar per share made the decision, as ThyssenKrupp decided not to raise the last offer of C$68 per share. ThyssenKrupp will be made a compensation payment of C$215 million dollars[1]. Arcelor has since found itself the target of a hostile takeover bid from Mittal Steel in which Dofasco played a significant poison pill role, its ownership being transferred to a Netherlands-based trust.
[edit] Employees
The company deals with its workforce in an incongruous manner which is simultaneously enlightened and paternalistic. Some of its practices are reminiscent of a 19th century company-town employer.
However, Dofasco vigorously attacks all attempts at union organizing by threatening to renegotiate these progressive programs. Approximately once each decade, the United Steelworkers of America attempts to unionize, but it has failed every time. Since USWA Local 1005 at Stelco tends to set the wages at Dofasco, a business failure or wage concessions at economically troubled Stelco could have a ripple effect on Dofasco.
