AK Steel Vaults Onto Prestigious Fortune 500 List
4 April 2000
AK Steel Vaults Onto Prestigious Fortune 500 List
MIDDLETOWN, Ohio--April 3, 2000--AK Steel has ascended to the prestigious Fortune 500 list of the country's largest companies with a ranking of 372 for 1999, based on revenues of $4.285 billion. AK Steel was one of the 45 newcomers to the list for 1999. AK Steel joins 27 other companies based in Ohio on list published today by Fortune magazine, including a number of other southwestern Ohio companies such as Kroger, Procter & Gamble, Federated Department Stores, NCR, Cinergy, Mead, Fifth Third Bancorp and American Financial Group. AK Steel was also named to the 1999 Fortune Magazine "Most Admired Companies" List as well."AK Steel is proud to join one of the most prestigious lists in American business," said Richard M. Wardrop, Jr., chairman and chief executive officer of AK Steel. "The completion in 1999 of our Rockport (IN) Works, coupled with the acquisition of Armco helped to drive revenues significantly higher in 1999."
AK Steel acquired Armco Inc., its former parent company, on September 30, 1999, a move that propelled AK Steel 384 slots up the Fortune 500 list. AK Steel has led the domestic integrated steel industry in operating profit per ton for six consecutive years. The completion of Rockport Works and the merger with Armco has boosted AK Steel's higher-margin stainless steel shipments from a few hundred thousand tons to more than a million tons annually. AK Steel's total shipments in 1999 were 6.5 million tons.
AK Steel produces flat-rolled carbon, stainless and electrical steel products for automotive, appliance, construction and manufacturing markets, as well as standard pipe and tubular steel products. AK Steel is headquartered in Middletown, Ohio. It employs about 11,000 men and women in steel plants and offices in Middletown, Coshocton, Mansfield, Warren and Zanesville, Ohio; Ashland, Kentucky; Rockport, Indiana; and Butler, Sharon and Wheatland, Pennsylvania. AK Steel also produces snow and ice control products, standard pipe and tubular products and operates a major industrial park on the Houston, Texas ship channel.