101 made redundant as steel firm goes into administration

MORE than 100 staff have been made redundant after a steel firm in Newport went into administration.

Administrators at business rescue and recovery specialists Begbies Traynor were appointed to AIC Steel on Tuesday. Yesterday they announced that 101 employees at the company had been made redundant on the same day.

Before going into administration the company, a steel fabricator and erector business, employed 130 employees. Begbies Traynor said the remaining 29 employees will continue to assist the business.

AIC Steel Limited was established to acquire the business and assets of Rowecord Engineering Limited which was placed into administration in May 2013. The acquisition by AIC went through in March 2014. The company trades from Usk Road, Newport.

Joint administrators David Hill and Huw Powell – from Begbies Traynor’s Cardiff office – were appointed on October 4.

A statement issued on behalf of the company said that Begbies Traynor is currently investigating the viability of continuing trading, while the administrators have also begun efforts to secure a buyer for the business.

The Middle East-based structural steel firm AIC Steel Group announced in March 2014 that it was to open its first UK manufacturing facility on the eight-acre site.

The Rowecord plant had gone into administration in April 2013, owing £24m and making 430 people redundant.

AIC Steel acquired the land and equipment for an undisclosed sum, and said it would make a £10m investment in the plant.

In January 2015 it was reported that it had £8m of contracts on its order books, including installing steelwork for the redevelopment of Bristol City’s Ashton Gate stadium and a residential development in London’s Mayfair.

By then its workforce had reached 100, including many former Rowecord staff. But by May of last year Construction Enquirer was reporting that the company was making cutbacks having failed to secure further orders.

Dyfed Steel, a supplier based in Llanelli, Carmarthenshire, said yesterday it had not supplied the company this year but that AIC had placed an order for steel worth more than £5,000 last Thursday, just three working days before going into administration.

The AIC Steel Group is based in the Middle East and designs, fabricates and erects structural steel and towers, delivering structural steelwork solutions to the construction industry over a wide range of market sectors.

AIC Steel said at the time it acquired the Rowecord site that it would use the 28,000 sq metre Usk Way plant as its UK manufacturing hub and would open a sales office in London to target major projects.

AIC Steel UK chief executive Michael Treacy said then: “We are delighted to be able to announce this investment and a long-term commitment to Newport, which is helped by the fact that we aren’t answerable to shareholders and are backed by a major global parent company.

“We have a clear strategy for building a thriving business here in the UK.”