Bolero has announced that four major steel mills in Japan are using its ePresentation platform to facilitate faster and more efficient transactions with key trading hubs such as Australia and South America. The latest, Kobe Steel Ltd, joined Bolero’s growing ecosystem of trade counterparties this month, following growing industry demand from major mining suppliers.
Kobe Steel Ltd joins Nippon Steel Sumitomo Metal Corporation (NSSMC), the largest steel producer in Japan, JFE Steel Corporation and Nisshin Steel Co., Ltd., which have all used Bolero for live transactions.
Along with iron ore shipments, all four will use ePresentation for other commodity group transactions, including nickel, manganese and coal.
Commenting on the announcement, Bolero CEO Ian Kerr said: “This resurgence in demand for ePresentation follows requests from two of the biggest multinational exporters for paperless trade. The fact that four of Japan’s biggest steel mills are now actively using the technology for multiple commodity types will undoubtedly prompt other enterprises in the country to follow suit.”
Underpinned by the ICC’s internationally-accepted eUCP standard, the Bolero platform can be utilised to legally replace original paper documents with universally-accepted electronic ones, radically reducing the time they spend in transit. Having eliminated the need for paper trade documents, businesses using Bolero potentially realise improved working capital, accelerated time to cash and more effective credit line management.
NSSMC also commented: “We have resumed receiving electronic documents from major overseas ferrous material suppliers because of their strong requests. The benefits and the size of merits we get from ePresentation are different from those of major suppliers, however, we would expect we can achieve improved efficiency together within the industry.”