Major steelmaker Hoa Phat plans $541 mln rail steel factory in central Vietnam

Hoa Phat Group, a leading steelmaker in Vietnam, plans to invest VND14 trillion ($541 million) in a factory to produce steel for railway infrastructure.

The plan was unveiled by Hoa Phat’s chairman Tran Dinh Long at the 2025 AGM on Thursday.

This move comes in response to the Prime Minister’s call for Hoa Phat (HoSE: HPG) to manufacture rail steel last September, as Vietnam accelerates the development of major railway projects, including the giant North-South high-speed railway, Long said.

The new plant will be located within the Hoa Phat Dung Quat 2 Iron and Steel Production Complex in the central province of Quang Ngai, with the first products expected to be rolled out by May 2027, he noted.

Addressing concerns over potential impacts from the U.S. steel tariffs, Hoa Phat’s general director Nguyen Viet Thang said the company maintains a long-term target of keeping exports below 20% of total revenue, despite exports making up a record high 31% in 2024.

Currently, Hoa Phat exports to 40 countries and territories, with the U.S. market representing just 1% of total exports. As a result, Thang said, the impact of U.S. tariffs would be mild, and the company is prepared to shift focus to other markets if needed.

In the first quarter of this year, HPG earned VND37 trillion ($1.43 billion) in revenue, up 19% year-on-year, and VND3.3 trillion ($127.5 million) in net profit, up 15%. This is the best quarterly profit result since Q2/2022.

This year, Hoa Phat aims to generate VND170 trillion ($6.65 billion) in revenue, marking a 21% increase from 2024 and surpassing its previous peak of VND151 trillion in 2021.

The steel heavyweight also aims for VND34.5 trillion ($1.35 billion) in net profit in 2025, up 24.7% from last year and the second-highest annual profit.