Manufacturing · Profile from Manufacturing Research Companion: Companies, Strategic Moves, and Technical Studies
Cleveland-Cliffs
The Cleveland, Ohio iron-ore miner — Great Lakes pellets since the nineteenth century — that under CEO Lourenco Goncalves turned itself in 2020 into the largest flat-rolled steel producer in North America by buying AK Steel (closed 13 Mar 2020) and ArcelorMittal USA (closed 9 Dec 2020), built an HBI plant in Toledo, bid for U.S. Steel and lost to Nippon Steel (2023), bought Canada's Stelco (1 Nov 2024), and then lost money: a $714m net loss in 2024 and $1.4bn in 2025 on $18.6bn of revenue, with adjusted EBITDA of just $37m (company). It closed three former Bethlehem and ArcelorMittal plants (Steelton, Conshohocken, Riverdale), idled the Minorca mine and Dearborn's steelmaking, and bet on Section 232 tariffs at 50% and the 25% auto tariffs to bring automotive demand home. By Q3 2026 it was profitable again ($165m GAAP net income, adjusted EBITDA $612m) and was guiding to adjusted EBITDA above $4bn in 2027 (company outlook). Cliffs' manufacturing story is vertical integration from ore to automotive sheet without the cost position to carry it through a trough — owning the pellets means a low ore price does not help you, and owning blast furnaces means a downturn hurts more.
At a glance
- Founded
- 1847 as the Cleveland Iron Mining Company; Cleveland-Cliffs Iron Company from an 1891 merger (both from memory, verify)
- Headquarters
- Cleveland, Ohio
- Ownership / structure
- Public (NYSE: CLF)
- Leadership (2026)
- Lourenco Goncalves, chairman, president and CEO (CEO since Aug 2014 after a proxy contest, from memory, verify)
- Segments
- One reportable steelmaking segment in recent filings (from memory, verify), spanning US and Canadian integrated mills, EAFs, finishing plants, the Toledo HBI plant, iron-ore pellet mines in Minnesota and Michigan, coke, tooling and stamping, and scrap (Ferrous Processing and Trading — section 14)
- Scale
- 2025: revenue $18.6bn (2024 $19.2bn); GAAP net loss $1.4bn ($2.91 a share; 2024 −$714m); adjusted EBITDA $37m (2024 $773m); raw steel 18.8m net tons (2024 17.7m) (company, Feb 2026). Q3 2026 (19 Oct 2026, 8-K): revenue ~$5.6bn; GAAP net income $165m ($0.26); adjusted EBITDA $612m (Q2 $286m; Q3 2025 $143m); steel shipments 4.15m net tons (Q3 2025 4.03m); Q2 2026 net loss $134m; 9M 2026 shipments 12.283m net tons (−1.4%)
- Plants (selected)
- Burns Harbor and Indiana Harbor (Indiana); Cleveland Works (Ohio); Middletown (Ohio); Butler (Pennsylvania; grain-oriented electrical steel, from memory, verify); Dearborn (Michigan; steelmaking idled 2025); Toledo HBI (Ohio); Stelco's Hamilton and Lake Erie Works (Ontario); pellet mines incl. Hibbing (partly idled), Minorca (idled), United Taconite, Northshore and Tilden (from memory for the list beyond Hibbing and Minorca, verify). Closed: Steelton, Conshohocken, Riverdale (decision 2025, 10-K)
- Signature moves (incl. failures)
- Goncalves's 2014 takeover and the iron-ore collapse; the Toledo HBI plant (2020); AK Steel (2020); ArcelorMittal USA (2020); the failed U.S. Steel bid (2023); Stelco (2024); the 2024–26 idlings, closures and losses; the Section 232 and auto-tariff bet (2025–26)
8 strategic moves analysed
Each one gets a full strategy file in the companion: context, the decision, the financing, what happened, and the lesson.
2014
Goncalves Proxy Fight and the Iron Ore Collapse
Leadership change (activist proxy contest) / restructuring and strategy pivot (exit from international mining, refocus on US pellets)
2020
AK Steel Acquisition
Acquisition / forward vertical integration (ore supplier buys its customer)
2020
ArcelorMittal USA Acquisition
Acquisition (purchase of a foreign group's US subsidiary) — scale and integration
2020
Toledo HBI Plant
New plant (greenfield) / vertical integration — a direct-reduction plant making hot-briquetted iron (HBI) for electric-arc furnaces
2023
Failed US Steel Bid
Acquisition attempt (unsolicited bid, auction, public opposition to the winner) — failure
2024
Idlings Closures and Losses
Restructuring (plant closures and idlings) — failure of the integrated cost structure in a downturn
2024
Stelco Acquisition
Acquisition (cross-border, cash and stock)
2025
Section 232 and the Auto Tariff Bet
Trade-policy bet / pricing and capacity — positioning the company to gain from metals and auto tariffs, plus a strategic-partnership search (POSCO)