WCA March 2009

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Forty years of Upcast ®

lines sold by the end of the 1970s. Landmarks of 50 and 100 commissioned lines were crossed in 1983 and 1993 respectively. Coming to the 21 st century, the Outokumpu Group’s management decided to focus on stainless steel products and divest its copper products division. This was followed later by an announcement from the new owner (Nordic Capital) to concentrate in copper semis production and to sell or close down all of its newly-acquired technology companies. At that moment Castform Oy’s management joined forces with two outside investors to ensure the continuity of Upcast business activities and Upcast Oy was born. Upcast technology continues to be among leading continuous casting systems for oxygen-free copper and copper alloy rod production with more than

In the late 1960s, when many commercially available casting methods for copper and copper alloys were in use, typically casting downward or horizontal, a decision was made at Outokumpu’s Pori (Finland) plant to find a way to cast rod closer to the size of the final product. work culminated in the first successful upward test casting in 1968 and a couple of years later the first production line was installed at the Pori foundry. The inventors of the technology were convinced that the Upcast ® method had so much potential that it deserved active in-house development and should be treated as a valuable technological innovation, so sales and development of upward casting technology was made into its own business entity within Outokumpu’s copper division, the JAVA-unit (later renamed Outokumpu Castform Oy). The unit’s work proved fruitful, with 21 The initial development

170 units sold to date – a total annual capacity of around 1.5 million tons. The innovative spirit of early Upcast technology pioneers lives on within the Upcast Oy staff. Confidence is strong in the future and in finding new ways of utilising this flexible technology. The birthday is taken to be the day of the first m m successful test casting, 6 th November 1968

Upcast Oy – Finland Fax : +358 207 577 401 Email : info@upcast.com Website : www.upcast.com

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Wire & Cable ASIA – March/April 2009