Sumitomo Metals Welcomed Shareholders on Factory Visits

Sumitomo Metal Industries (Sumitomo Metals) invited shareholders to visit our factories this year. Our aim is to present an opportunity for our shareholders to have a personal understanding of what Sumitomo Metals is in actuality, by visiting our mills and with their own eyes seeing our employees at work.

This year we escorted 600 persons (shareholders and their accompanying persons) and arranged eight factory visits in total. There were two tours each at the Kashima Steel Works (Kashima City, Ibaragi Prefecture), the Osaka Steel Works (Osaka City), the Wakayama Steel Works (Wakayama City), and Sumitomo Metals (Kokura), Ltd. (Kita-Kyushu City, Fukuoka Prefecture).

Our visitors were able to see the dynamic manufacturing lines through which red-hot steel were processed into manufactured products. They also visited production sites where cutting-edge technologies are used to control the process with precision measured in microns (in thousandths of a millimeter). After the tours, Q&A sessions were held. Sumitomo Metals' directors directly replied to a wide range of questions, enabling those present to better understand the Company.

We are planning another round of factory tours in the spring of 2009. Our plan is that in the spring all four manufacturing facilities mentioned above will be visited, but we hope to increase the number of tours from two to three, making 12 tours in total.

Sumitomo Metals will continue to strive to establish and maintain dialogues with shareholders. We aim to continue to be a company trusted by shareholders and other stakeholders.

1.Dates and places
(1)Autumn 2008:8 factory visits
Kashima Steel Works : October 3 (Fri) and 4 (Sat)
Osaka Steel Works : October 17 (Fri) and 18 (Sat)
Wakayama Steel Works : November 7 (Fri) and 8 (Sat)
Sumitomo Metals (Kokura), Ltd. : November 21 (Fri) and 22 (Sat)

(2)Spring 2009 (Plan; subject to change) : 12 factory visit plans in total
Wakayama Steel Works : March 13 (Fri), 14 (Sat), and May 22 (Fri)
Osaka Steel Works : March 18 (Wed), 19 (Thu), and 20 (Fri)
Kashima Steel Works : April 8 (Wed), 10 (Fri), and 11 (Sat)
Sumitomo Metals (Kokura), Ltd. : April 16 (Wed), 17 (Thu), and 18 (Sat)

2.Number of invitees (shareholders and their accompanying persons)
Autumn of 2008 : 600 persons
Spring of 2009 : 900 persons(selected by lots in case of oversubscription)
Total for the fiscal year : 1,500 persons

3.Opinions and comments received from the participants
The rare opportunity to visit the factory made me better understand Sumitomo Metals.
I became proud to be a shareholder of the Company.
I felt pleased to have held the stock for a long time.
I sensed the employees'strong feelings and enthusiasm for technology and manufacturing.
The factory was much cleaner than expected and attentive to safety issues.

4.Points of visits
(1)Wakayama Steel Works
New No.1 blast furnace : Visited the construction site.
Steel making plant: Visited the operation room and looked at the process of pouring molten pig iron and scraps to a basic oxygen furnace, and blowing in of oxygen.
Medium-size seamless pipe and tube making plant : Looked at the manufacturing processes from round billets into seamless pipe.

(2)Kashima Steel Works
No.1 blast furnace : Rode the bus up to the cast house (where the tapping process is conducted in the blast furnace) and observed how the pig iron was tapped and ran through a runner
Hot strip mill : Looked at the processes whereby heated slabs were rolled.

(3)Sumitomo Metals (Kokura), Ltd.
Blast furnace : Visited the operating room and looked at the pig iron tapping process.
Bar mill:Observed the processes of how a mill turned heated steel billets into steel bars.
Wire rod mill : Observed the manufacturing process that heated steel billets turned into wire rod coils

(4)Osaka Steel Works
Die forging plant : Observed the manufacturing process where heated billets were forged into crankshafts by a 16,000-ton high-speed forging press.
Railway wheel and axle manufacturing plant : Observed the manufacturing processes where heated steel were forged by a 9,000-ton water-pressure pressing machine and formed into rolling stock wheels.
Railway bogie truck manufacturing plant : Saw an assembly line for rolling stock cars.
Steel History Museum : Visited the museum that opened in 2001, commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Osaka Steel Works. Looked at the exhibits related to the facilities'history as well as manufactured products.

Note : Points visited in the spring of 2009 may differ from those in the autumn of 2008.