Manager: Buyout benefits all

Workers' pay and benefits will continue unchanged, and the new owners have added 10 employees to the work force.
By CYNTHIA VINARSKY
VINDICATOR BUSINESS WRITER
THE VINDICATOR
YOUNGSTOWN -- "Is it a good deal?"
It's a question V & amp;M Star steelworkers have asked former plant manager Jim Cowan repeatedly since two companies -- one French and one Japanese -- paid $380 million for the Youngstown tube mill and its Houston sister plant in May.
"You didn't mean: Is it a good deal for them?" he told plant workers Tuesday. "You meant, is it a good deal for you and your families and me and my family," said Cowan, now president and chief operating officer for V & amp;M.
Cowan addressed more than 250 salaried and hourly V & amp;M workers Tuesday with assurances that the sale will benefit them, as well as the new owners.
"When your No. 1 customer wants a piece of the action, it's a great vote of confidence," he said. "V & amp;M Tube is the world leader in what you do, making seamless pipe, and you're making them stronger. The future is very bright."
New owners
Vallourec, a French tube maker, and the world's largest producer of seamless steel tubes, announced plans to buy the former North Star Steel Division from Minneapolis-based Cargill in the spring. The deal was a partnership with Japanese-owned Sumitomo Corp. of America.
The sale, final in July, made Vallourec 80 percent owner of the newly formed V & amp;M Star; Sumitomo owns 20 percent.
Representatives from all three companies visited the Youngstown mill Tuesday to celebrate the acquisition, tour the plant and meet with workers.
Cowan said the new owners have kept all the 460 former North Star employees at the Youngstown mill and added 10 workers in the information technology and accounting departments.
Wages, benefits and profit sharing remain the same under V & amp;M, he said. The average operator earns $17.80 per hour, maintenance employees earn 10 percent more.
V & amp;M also plans to follow the no-layoff policy that North Star had, Cowan said. Production has been at 50 percent because of reduced demand in the fourth quarter, but no regular V & amp;M employees have been laid off.
Buyers' reasons
Jean-Claude Cabre, chairman and chief operating officer of Vallourec, said the company wanted to buy seamless tube plants because they wanted a larger share of the growing global energy market and liked the idea of a partnership with Sumitomo.
It chose North Star's plants in Youngstown and Houston because the employees share Vallourec's enthusiasm, dedication and entrepreneurial spirit, he said.
"You are doers, not talkers, and you have a focus on customer satisfaction. This fits very well with the way we manage."
Cabre said the fact that the former North Star plants are not unionized was also a factor in the decision.
The company has several unionized mills in France and Germany.
Jean-Yves LeCuziat, chief executive of V & amp;M Star, also praised the plants' safety record, product quality and product mix.
While 2002 has been slow for the gas and oil well drilling industry, he projected improvements in 2003 and said he expects to grow the business further.
vinarsky@vindy.com