Tata Steel UK has Thursday signed a definitive sale agreement to sell its Speciality Steels business to Liberty House Group for a total consideration of pound 100 million.

The sale agreement covers several South Yorkshire-based assets including the electric arc steelworks and bar mill at Rotherham, the steel purifying facility in Stocksbridge and a mill in Brinsworth as well as service centres in Bolton and Wednesbury, UK, and in Suzhou and Xi'an, China. Speciality Steels directly employs about 1,700 people making steels for the aerospace, automotive and the oil & gas industries.

Bimlendra Jha, CEO of Tata Steel UK, said, "This is good news for Speciality Steels and for Tata Steel's core business in the UK. For Speciality Steels, which is largely independent of our European strip products supply chain, this is an important step forward in securing a future for the business under new ownership. Today's news also marks another important step forward in realising a more sustainable future for our Port Talbot-based supply chain in the UK."

Jha added, "Like our former Scunthorpe-based Long Products business which we sold last year, we will be handing over a business which has been transformed following difficult decisions to restructure and re-focus on higher-value markets. Employees, trade unions and the management team have worked incredibly hard at Speciality Steels to improve its performance and I'm delighted to say that the business is now on an improvement track which will enable it to thrive in the future."

Shares of the company gained Rs 4.7, or 1.02%, to trade at Rs 464.60. The total volume of shares traded was 189,498 at the BSE (10.33 a.m., Friday).