In March, steelmaking group Corus delivered its first full time profit since it was formed by the merger of British Steel and Hoogovens in 1999 with pre-tax profits of £559M against a loss of £255M the previous year. Much of the turnaround was put down to the strength of the Chinese market & demand for steel. But the company is also coming up with innovative products such as a square tin for food known as Le Carré. Round tins are cheaper to produce, but there is demand for square tins from the supermarkets which say that there is a 20% saving on shelf space, something they are willing to pay a premium price to have. ASDA and Tesco are already looking at using the square tins, although Sainsbury's has presently rejected the idea of using them. (whole item)
