Affival: an outward-looking french company with german share-holders

In 1981‚ Affival developed an original process using cored wire to help the injection into liquid steel of certain elements for treatment, adjustment or enhancement. This company, which is in Solesmes (northern France), has became the world leader in its market over a period of thirty years. It has a turnover of nearly 200 million Euros‚ 90 million of which is generated by the French site‚ and employs 250 people, 130 of which work in France. It is well-known both for its capacity for innovation which prompted it to diversify into foundries and the treatment of copper and aluminium, and also for its good client relations. Affival now has subsidiaries in the United States, Mexico, South Korea, Japan, China and Russia. The parent company‚ which is in charge of the entire group and is on the site as the R&D and innovation departments‚ is still in Solesmes. However, its share-holders, the SKW Metallurgie Group based in Munich, are German. This is one way of combining French creativity with a slow return on investment of German capital.