The Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC; Governor: AMAKAWA Kazuhiko) signed on September 17 a loan agreement amounting to up to USD171 million (JBIC portion) with JSW JFE Electrical Steel Private Limited (J2ES), a company jointly owned by JFE Steel Corporation (JFE Steel) and JSW Steel Limited (JSW), an Indian company. The loan is co-financed with Mizuho Bank, Ltd., MUFG Bank, Ltd., and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, bringing the total co-financing amount to USD285 million.
The loan is intended to provide the India-based J2ES, which was established in 2024, with the funds necessary to establish facilities for its high-grade grain-oriented electrical steel sheets (GOES) manufacturing and sales business in the state of Karnataka, India.
India, the world’s second-largest steel consumer after China, is seeing higher electricity demand due to its economic development, as well as increased use of renewable energy and the need to improve transformer efficiency. These needs drive growth in India’s demand for high-grade GOES, which is an indispensable material for transformer cores to reduce power losses. Given these market conditions, JFE Steel has set a goal of promoting and further deepening “insider” businesses with top-tier local partners in overseas growth regions under the JFE Group’s Eighth Medium-term Business Plan from FY2025 to FY2027. The company aims to capture growing demand in the Indian market by expanding J2ES’s high-grade GOES manufacturing and sales operation.
This loan will support JFE Steel’s overseas business development, thereby contributing toward maintaining and improving the international competitiveness of the Japanese industry. It will also help achieve global environmental conservation by supporting the manufacturing and sales of high-grade GOES, which are essential for minimizing transformer core losses.
As Japan’s policy-based financial institution, JBIC will continue to financially support the overseas business expansion of Japanese companies by drawing on its various financial facilities and schemes for structuring projects, and by performing its risk-assuming function in collaboration with private financial institutions.
