TATA Steel and Nippon Steel have signed a JV agreement to set up India’s first continuous annealing and processing line CAPL for the production of 600,000 tons per annum of automotive cold rolled steel at Jamshedpur.

TATA Steel will hold 51% and Nippon Steel will hold 49% of the equity capital of the JV company. While the chairman of the new JV will be nominated by Nippon, TATA Steel will appoint the MD. The JV is expected to be incorporated within one month.

The project will be set up at a capital cost of nearly INR 23 billion and is expected to come on stream in 2013.

According to a company statement “The JV will source steel from TATA Steel's plant. It will address the localization needs of Indian automotive customers for high grade cold rolled steel sheet and meet the needs of the growing automotive industry.”