Thyssenkrupp steel workers open to consolidation talks – labor boss

DUESSELDORF/FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Thyssenkrupp’s powerful labor representatives are open to consolidation talks in the steel sector, a leading union official told Reuters on Monday.

“It is clear that the search for strategic partners is being expanded to all parts of the company,” Knut Giesler, who heads IG Metall, Germany’s largest union, in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, where Thyssenkrupp is based.

Giesler said that IG Metall would prefer steel consolidation in Germany with peer Salzgitter , a scenario that has been discussed for years without any concrete results.

He said that if Thyssenkrupp were to agree a tie-up with overseas rivals IG Metall would demand the group keep a majority in the unit.

(Reporting by Tom Kaeckenhoff and Christoph Steitz; editing by Thomas Seythal)