Case Details

Year Initiated/Committed

2001

Year Resolved

2002

Court

U.S. District Court for the District of Utah

Docket Number

2:02CV00106G

Lead State

UT

Participating States

UT

Defendant(s)

Nucor Corporation; GS Industries, Inc.; GS Industries d/b/a GST Steel Company; Moly-Cop Chile, S.A.

Case Description

Nucor manufactures various forms of steel and has a “grinding ball division” in Brigham City, Utah. GS Inudstries is also engaged in the manufacture of various forms of steel and sells grinding media under the “Moly-Cop” brand. Moly-Cop Chile is owned by GSI. Until about August 2000, GSI and Nucor were competitors in the manufacture and sale f large forged steel grinding balls to mining companies in the United States and Canada. Laarge grinding balls are essential to mining operations and are used in the majority of mining operations in the Western U.S. Without high-quality large grinding balls many mining operations could not operate efficiently, resulting in higher operational costs, or in some cases, mine closure. In addition, mills that use large grinding balls use large quantities of them, in one instance over 100,000 tons per year. If the asset sale went through, GSI planned to ship the Nucor manufacturing equipment to Chile. This would leave GSI as the only grinding ball manufacturer in North America. Shortly after the agreement was reached for Nucor to sell its large grinding ball manufacturing assets to GSI, GSI sent a letter to its customers in the U.S. and to Nucor’s large granding ball customers announcing significant price increases of 20% or more. Given the barriers to entry (very high costs) for any new competitors, and the relatively captive market, the state alleged that these actions reflected an atempt by GSI to exert unlawful anti-competitive monopoly market influence. The charges were dismissed without prejecice when the GS defendants agreed not to ship the equipment out of the U.S. and to give the State at least 30 days notice prior to selling or disposing of the grinding media manufacturing equipment.