Business Enquirer Issue 110 | Speira | February'23

PROMISING MATERIAL, PROMISING FUTURE SPEIRA

PROMISING MATERIAL, PROMISING FUTURE

With around 5000 employees across its seven manufacturing plants including an R & D facility across Norway and Germany, Speira comes equipped with a century worth of knowledge in its sector.

With 25 years of industry experience at Norsk Hydro and in advising firms under his belt, CEO Einar Glomnes is mobilizing his team to secure Speira’s name as a leading player within the green transition.

Building a Circular World that Works

Speira is an aluminium rolling and recycling company, supplying its products and solutions to a wide range of industries including automotive, beverage can, building and construction, packaging and other industrial goods.

“Together with our customers, we're creating solutions for a constantly evolving market and a sustainable industry. Aluminium is precisely the right material

Spun-out of Europe’s biggest

for this, because the product innovations of today and tomorrow are light, versatile and infinitely recyclable - just like our aluminium,” explained Einar.

Aluminium today is cause and cure to climate change. But Aluminium is core to the green shift. Although it can be an energy intensive product to manufacture, with metal using coalbased power production emitting 20 units of C02 per unit of aluminium, Einar explained that this is all relative to power source.

“When using hydropower, aluminium requires just four units of CO2 per unit of aluminium. And when we create recycled aluminium, it can equate to zero,”.

Speira’s vision is to be a leading player and industry benchmark for sustainability by 2030.

“By using recycled materials, we reduce energy consumption by 95% without compromising on quality or product properties. Our sustainable product ORBIS is third-party certified and uses at least 75% external scrap. Moreover we are able to produce even more sustainable products with a recycled content of 85%,95% or even 100%,” said Einar, “and the good thing is, a used beverage can (UBC) can be made up of recycled materials from a window and a bicycle, for example - this is true circularity!”

aluminium company, Norsk Hydro, Speira is driven by the demands of the globe’s transition to ‘green’.

SPEIRA

PROJECT DIRECTED BY: CHIARA SALTER

ARTICLE

WRITTEN BY: LAURA WATLING

Taking Sustainability Seriously

When it comes to building a business at the forefront of the green transition, many companies talk the talk, but Speira is truly walking the walk, too.

By 2025, Speira aims to see the use of recycled materials in its products exceed 40%. In addition, as part of its 2030 vision it aims to ensure that all of its aluminium products are fully recovered and recycled.

“We are actively committed to creating a closed-loop material flow,” explained Einar, “we support several initiatives to ensure that more aluminium products are properly recycled at the end of their life. Innovative sorting and recycling technologies as well as close collaboration with our direct customers across industries will help us on this journey”.

Speira also sees transparency as key to

delivering sustainability. To fulfil this, it has achieved certifications in Aluminium Stewardship Initiative (ASI) Performance Standard, ASI Chain of Custody Standard, ISOs 9001, 14001, 45001, 50001, and the International Automotive Task Force (IATF).

Be The Change You Want To See

Both Speira and Einar pride themselves on the fact that the business offers real people real jobs, which enables them to contribute positively to the decarbonization of our business and the societies we are part of, daily.

“The carve out of Speira from Norsk Hydro served as an excellent learning experience and team building activity,” shared Einar, “it has enabled us to build a strong identity and has brought the team together. Now, we know we can work together to create incredible things”.

Einar truly believes in authentic leadership always focusing more on asking – the right – questions rather than giving answers. “I truly believe in the capabilities and dedication of our people. My role as CEO is to support my team and the organization to drive our transformation and develop our company culture further. I truly believe in the success of wellfunctioning teams, strong ownership for results and taking the initiative to win. All of this has its roots in the trust in each other and in our strength and capabilities,” Einar explains.

With the recent acquisition of the European assets of Real Alloy, Speira faces the opportunity of integrating an additional 500 colleagues into the business in 2023. There is further great potential for Speira from the buy-out, not only from the acquisition of an additional three manufacturing sites in Germany and two Norway.

“The big win is the additional competence and years of experience we will obtain from our new colleagues from Real Alloy. We hope this will bolster our ambitions to develop our product portfolio further and base it on even more recycled metal,” said Einar.

The acquisition of Real Alloy will also push to establish Speira as a leading supplier of high-quality, low carbon metal based on recycling.

The focus for the coming months will be to meet customer demands without overstretching the business.

“Although global supply chain issues are calming, we need to secure our position and manage the risks. So far, we have been very successful at this, and within the next 12-18 months I see Speira being in a strong position, with the ability to take on both smaller and larger growth projects,” Einar closes.

www.speira.com