We are looking for a partner who has good connections into residential or commercial real estate projects in China, the US, or the Philippines and $1 million to invest. We are a US company, and have a $2 million USD high capacity light steel framing plant, located in China, and have gotten it up and operational this past month. This is a highly profitable industry, and at full production, our plant has a $26 million USD EBITDA. It produces light steel framing for condos, houses, walkups, mining camp living modules, and more.

The biggest advantages our plant offers are panelized light steel building systems--this means your construction projects goes up faster, more than 8x faster than concrete, and with typhoon-proof strength and higher quality fit and finish. This is a major advantage in high-growth areas such as China, the largest construction market in the world right now (having surpassed the US in 2010). Being able to build significantly faster, with superior fit and finish and with a greener, LEED friendly material such as our light steel, is a major advantage and selling point. We are now looking for a new equity partner to help us get started.

Our ideal new partner has:

-- connections and the ability to sell to big real estate projects, either residential or commercial

-- the right political connections to handle the customs, permitting, politics, and other red tape involved with Real Estate development projects, especially if not in US

-- a project in the pipeline right now, for fast startup

Our basic story is we commissioned this plant in Shanghai with another American business partner, with an agreement in place to lease it to them, and to receive fee for services for operational and logistical support. It turns out that this was a mistake: shortly after we got the plant operational, the house of cards that our erstwhile partner's many business ventures were based upon collapsed, and a storm of lawsuits ensued. Our equipment was frozen while the legal status of everything got sorted out, and this dragged out for more than 2 years. We couldn't make anything with our plant, and we couldn't move it. Finally, the judge ruled that the equipment was ours, we got the documentation and legal go-ahead, and relocated the plant to Dezhou, where we have just got the 2 most productive of the 4 lines up and running again. In the meantime, we ran out of money. No revenue and significant legal expenses for 2+ years has drained us, and we've lost talent, time, and connections due to our prolonged inactivity.

Now we've turned the plant back on and things are turning around. We're ready to ramp up and launch and we are looking to bring another partner in, who can bring working capital and connections to potential end markets--such as large real estate projects--to the table for us. We are looking for $1 million. We need to buy steel and equipment, recruit and build another team, and build some prototypes and demonstration products, and need to find and close our first project to get started. The upside is significant, and the risk is quite a bit lower than usual with our startup, being ameliorated by the value of the actual plant and equipment. For more information, please consult our business plan and proforma financials, or contact Cameron at cameron *at* bluestarsteel *dot* org with any questions.