Vale Canada
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Vale Canada Limited, doing business as Vale Base Metals,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> is a majority owned subsidiary of the Brazilian mining company Vale with Manara Minerals holding a 10 per cent minority share. The company was created from the former Inco, which Vale acquired in 2007. Vale's nickel mining and metals division is headquartered in London with a corporate center in Toronto. It produces nickel, copper, cobalt, and other Platinum Group Metals. Prior to being purchased by CVRD (now Vale) in 2006, Inco was the world's second largest producer of nickel, and the third largest mining company outside South Africa and Russia of platinum group metals. It was also a charter member of the 30-stock Dow Jones Industrial Average formed on October 1, 1928.
History
Takeovers (2005–2006)
On October 11, 2005, Inco's CEO Scott Hand announced a friendly takeover bid to buy out the operations of longtime rival Falconbridge for $12 billion.<ref name="tplim">Template:Cite news</ref> If approved, the deal would have made Inco the world's largest producer of nickel. Davis's Xstrata (which already owned ~20% of Falconbridge shares) subsequently submitted a hostile takeover bid for Falconbridge, resulting in a bidding war between Inco and Xstrata. The Xstrata bid was successful, but not before Falconbridge employed a poison pill to delay the acquisition, raising its share price from $28 to $62.50 in the meantime.<ref name="jmgm">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="forbes">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="tfti">Template:Cite news</ref>
Teck Cominco submitted a hostile takeover bid to purchase Inco on May 8, 2006 for $16 billion if it agreed to abandon its takeover of Falconbridge.<ref name="crashing">Template:Cite newsTemplate:Dead link</ref> On June 26 of the same year, Phelps Dodge submitted a friendly takeover bid to purchase a combined Inco and Falconbridge for around $40 billion;<ref name="cnus">Template:Cite news</ref> that offer was also withdrawn because of the failure of the Inco-Falconbridge merger.<ref name=jmgm/><ref name="mhwsj">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="pdinbc">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="mhwp">Template:Cite news</ref>
On August 14, 2006 Brazilian mining company Vale S.A. (aka CVRD) extended an all-cash offer to buy Inco for $17 billion. That offer received approval from the Canadian government's investment review agency on October 19, and was accepted by Inco shareholders on October 23.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Part of the takeover deal was that CVRD would operate Inco as a separate nickel mining division; all of CVRD's nickel operations, including mines at Onca Puma and Vermelho in Brazil, were transferred to Inco's management. Inco was delisted from the NYSE on November 16, 2006 and the TSX on January 5, 2007. According to its current web site, Inco is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Vale (formerly CVRD).<ref name=jmgm/>
As subsidiary
The 2009-10 Vale-Inco strike lasted 15 months; one of the longest on record in Canada.<ref name="cstm1">Template:Cite news</ref>
In May 2010, Vale changed the name of Vale-Inco to simply Vale, stating the change is "a milestone that aligns it more fully with other Vale operations worldwide and reflects its position as part of the world's second largest mining company".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="jmsc">Template:Cite news</ref>
In 2015, Vale was said to be exploring an IPO of its base metals unit for $30–35 billion, in order to lighten its debt load.<ref name=sebbg>Template:Cite news</ref>
Reorganisation as VBM
In May 2023 it was announced that Mark Cutifani would be appointed as Chair of the new Vale Base Metals (VBM) subsidiary of global mining giant Vale S.A.<ref name="ft1">Template:Cite news</ref> Vale was looking to divest from its tar baby,<ref name="bnnb1">Template:Cite news</ref> as early as December 2022.<ref name="mt1">Template:Cite news</ref> At the time VBM was a supplier to Tesla and General Motors (GM).<ref name=mt1/> Reports were afoot that GM, Mitsui, and the Saudi Public Investment Fund were interested buyers of a 10% stake.<ref name=mt1/> Former Tesla executive Jerome Guillen would join the "energy transition board" of VBM along with Cutifani.<ref name=mcom1/>
In May 2023 it was announced that VBM had entered a joint venture with the Ford Motor Company and Huayou Cobalt on a $4.5bn nickel processing facility in Indonesia.<ref name=ft1/>
Vale spun out its metals business as a separate ringfenced entity headquartered in Toronto, with an independent board chaired by Cutifani. That process completed in July 2023. The unit was then one of the world's largest producers of nickel, copper, and cobalt, and had operations across the globe. The parent company's chief executive Eduardo Bartolomeo stated that Cutifani could help the division explore a future “liquidity event”.<ref name="mcom1">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="nob1">Template:Cite news</ref> In early 2023, the parent company earned 80% of its profits in its South American iron mines, and the balance from its Base Metals group.<ref name=ft1/>
In July 2023 Cutifani sold off 10% of the capital to the Saudi Public Investment Fund and 3% to Engine No. 1. The value of the transaction was $3.4 billion.<ref name="ss1">Template:Cite news</ref>
As of May 2024, Vale Canada was reported to have a sales agreement with "Xstrata Copper Canada" for the sale of copper anodes and copper concentrates produced in Sudbury.<ref name="mlo1">Template:Cite news</ref>
Criticism
In 2006 Inco was removed from the FTSE4Good Index for failing to meet their human rights criteria.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The company has had disputes with native groups and environmental concerns over mine runoff.
Labour relations
Employees for Inco in Canada are represented by the United Steelworkers throughout all the mergers. Because of the mergers, the United Steelworkers signed an agreement with all the unions that represent mining workers in countries where Vale/Inco operate to "work together cooperatively and strategically as global partners, to build the bargaining power of worker."<ref>United Steelworkers. Steelworkers and Global Union Partners Announce Unity Accord. March 20, 2007. Available at http://www.usw.ca/program/content/3964.php?lan=enTemplate:Dead link</ref> The unions include Confederação Nacional dos Trabalhadores no Setor Minera, SINTICIM, Union syndicale des ouvriers et employés de Nouvelle-Calédonie, Union des Syndicats des Travailleurs Kanak et Exploités, Fagforbundet for Industri og Energi, Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union, and the United Steelworkers.
Current operations
Ontario, Canada
- Coleman Mine, Vale's flagship nickel mine
- Copper Cliff North Mine
- Copper Cliff South Mine
- Creighton Mine
- Garson Mine
- Port Colborne Refinery
- Clarabelle Mill
- Totten mine
- Copper Cliff Smelter
- Copper Cliff Nickel Refinery
Manitoba, Canada
Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada
Indonesia
- Vale Inco's Indonesian joint venture PT Vale Indonesia Tbk, an Indonesian company which is 20 percent publicly owned (IDX:INCO), is located in Sorowako. In August 2011, a dispute began because PT Inco broke its promise to build 2 smelters in Pomala and Bahodopi in 2005 and 2010 respectively, and to hand over 50,000 hectares of its 118,000-hectare concession to locals. Based on the latest feasibility study, only the Bahodopi smelter facility was possible. The dispute might go to court.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
- October 11, 2011: After starting operation of its third hydropower plant at Karebbe with an output of 130 megawatts (MW), the company would increase production from 73,000 metric tons to 120,000 metric tons per year over the next five years. The first and second hydropower plants are located in Larona and Balambano with a combined output of 365 MW. As part of its Corporate Social Responsibility plan, the company has given a total of 8 MW from the plants to Perusahaan Listrik Negara (Indonesian Government Electric Company) for free.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
New Caledonia
- Vale Inco New Caledonia
In popular culture
Inco is a central theme in the Stompin' Tom Connors song "Sudbury Saturday Night". More recently, the Creighton Mine, owned by Vale and hosting the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory, figures largely in the plot of Robert J. Sawyer's Neanderthal Parallax trilogy.
See also
References
Filmography
- Joseph R. Kohn and Charles H. Wasserman (1956) - MILLING AND SMELTING THE SUDBURY NICKEL ORES
- Keith Harley (1973) - The Winning of Nickel (Westminster Films)
- Pages with broken file links
- Vale S.A.
- Nickel mining companies of Canada
- Mining in Ontario
- Companies based in Toronto
- 1902 establishments in Ontario
- Non-renewable resource companies established in 1902
- Economy of Greater Sudbury
- History of Greater Sudbury
- Canadian subsidiaries of foreign companies
- Canadian companies established in 1902
- Economic history of Canada
- Companies formerly listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange
- Companies formerly listed on the New York Stock Exchange
- Companies formerly listed on the London Stock Exchange
- Former components of the Dow Jones Industrial Average
- Metallurgical industry of Canada