SMS has been supplying equipment for the copper industry for decades – ranging from smelting and rolling equipment to presses and forging equipment for the production of bars, tubes, wire, sheet, slabs and other shapes. During the last few years, under the New Horizon initiative, SMS has markedly expanded and intensified its activities in supplying holistic solutions to the non-ferrous metals industry.
SMS now continues the traditional copper business of Andritz Maerz with a team of highly experienced specialists and engineers. Andritz Maerz brings 60 years of experience and more than 70 references of smelting and refining furnaces for primary and secondary copper production, including tilting refining furnaces, elliptical furnaces, shaft and hearth-shaft furnaces, drum-type furnaces (including Peirce-Smith converter and anode furnaces), bath smelters as well as Top Blown Rotating Converters (TBRC). The tilting and drum type furnaces enable high-quality wire, tube and section production, as well as production of anodes for electrolysis.
SMS’s recently developed innovations such as BlueControl (dynamic process control simulation), H₂-ready systems (solutions for carbon footprint reduction using innovative burners and refining technologies based on hydrogen) as well as various performance-enhancing modules (as equipment and instrumentation upgrades) will be integrated into the products of the Andritz Maerz copper furnace business.
Furthermore, SMS is going to expand its service activities, building on its existing strong international network of 3,000 specialists and over 50 workshops, which provide modular, machine-specific spare parts solutions for any customer requirements. The service encompasses everything from on-demand supplies of individual spare parts, the supply of spare parts packages right up to complete warehousing service. SMS provides warehousing service complete with planning, procurement and logistics. Service technicians are available at any time to support customers with troubleshooting and necessary repairs. Active around the globe, SMS guarantees short reaction times and readily available support. This means customers can rely on their plants being up and running again in next to no time.
With the important know-how transfer from Andritz Maerz, SMS is further expanding its strong position as a supplier of complete solutions for the non-ferrous metals industry. With its wide product portfolio, SMS offers complete solutions for primary and the growing number of secondary metals production lines – including for the recycling of electronic scrap (BlueMetals Process), batteries (BlueBattery Process) and catalytic converters (BlueCAT process).
Copper is essential to our everyday lives and to the electrification of the world. Its high thermal and electrical conductivity, good ductility and formability make copper a key industrial metal. Copper can be extracted from ore or recycled – without loss of quality – from copper products. Today, about 30 % of the copper used worldwide is copper recycled from scrap and waste. With its extensive portfolio of copper furnace technology, SMS aims to increase the recycling rate by closing the loop of resources, thus making a significant contribution to promoting the circular economy.
_{(Source: SMS group)}