At least since the turn of the year, the world economy has again become propitious for the international steel industry. In January the Word Steel Association announced that “In December 2009, world crude steel output was 106.4 million t, an increase of 30.2% compared to December 2008. Most major steel producing countries showed two-digit growth in December 2009.” This confirms the short range outlook of the World Steel Association forecasting for 2010 a global steel demand growth by 9.2% to 1,206 million t, which is a recovery to the level of 2008. Now we will see how well the steel producers will have positioned themselves for the time after the crisis. Many companies have not only used the last few months for capacity adjustments but also for highly promising modernization projects. This issue of MPT International will feature again an article on ThyssenKrupp Acciai Speciali Terni. Belonging to the Stainless Global business area of ThyssenKrupp Materials, the Terni site in northern Italy has undergone a major upgrade during the last few years, particularly the steel plant and the slab casting plant. In our last issue, we published an article about the new slab caster for stainless steel. The new caster has been designed for a total capacity of approximately 900,000 t/year of 215 mm thick stainless steel slabs, covering the complete range of stainless grades, including AISI 300 and 400 families (austenitic, ferritic and martensitic grades). The new single strand slab caster was successfully started up with a cast of AISI 304 grade. In this issue we focus on the ThyssenKrupp Terni steelmaking plant, more precisely on the secondary metallurgical processes designed for refining superferritic stainless steels. In summer 2008, a new 150 t VD/VOD plant was commissioned. The vacuum degassing (VD)/vacuum oxygen decarburisation (VOD) process enables refining operations to be carried out outside the melting furnace. The VD/VOD system offers the advantage of performing all metallurgical steps in one unit. The product mix produced at this plant also covers several forging grades. The prevailing grades are ferritic stainless steels, including some state-of-the-art superferritic grades. Obviously last year was a challenging one for the stainless steel market. However, every crisis offers new chances and ThyssenKrupp Acciai Speciali Terni seems to have taken advantage of this opportunity. The modernization measures presented in this issue of MPT International can serve as a good example of how to get well prepared for new challenges to come after the crisis. (A. Hannewald)