OREANDA-NEWS. August 3, 2011. ITOCHU Corporation (Headquartered in Minato-ku, Tokyo; Masahiro Okafuji, President & CEO; hereinafter “Itochu”) and its wholly owned subsidiary, ITOCHU Metals Corporation (Headquartered in Minato-ku, Tokyo; Masaki Oka, President & CEO;hereinafter ’’IMC’’), hereby announces that a Consortium consisting of Itochu, IMC and its joint partners executed and completed the acquisition of 100% of the outstanding shares of ARCO Aluminum, Inc. (Louisville, Kentucky; Patrick Franc, President; hereinafter “ARCO”) from BP Company North America Inc. (Houston, Texas, USA; Steven Bray, President; hereinafter “BP”) at an acquisition price of USD  680 million on August 1, 2011, in line with the schedule announced on April 4, 2011. ARCO was a wholly owned subsidiary of BP, serving as a manufacturer and supplier of rolled aluminum sheet.

*The joint partners (hereinafter, together with IMC, collectively “the Partners”) are:

-  Sumitomo Light Metal Industries, Ltd. (Minato-ku, Tokyo; Shigenori Yamauchi, President; hereinafter “SLM”)

-  Furukawa-Sky Aluminum Corp. (Headquartered in Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo; Masateru Yoshihara, President & CEO; hereinafter "Furukawa-Sky")

-  Sumitomo Corporation (Chuo-ku, Tokyo; Susumu Kato, President and CEO; hereinafter “Sumitomo Corp”);

The shares were subscribed by the Partners with the following ownership ratio:

SLM: 40%; Furukawa-Sky: 35%; Sumitomo Corp: 20%; ITOCHU: 2% and IMC: 3%

In addition, ARCO changed its name to Tri-Arrows Aluminum Inc. (hereinafter “TAA”) effective August 1,2011.

TAA owns an approximate 45% interest in the aggregate assets of Logan Mill (unincorporated joint business venture), an aluminum rolling mill that is one of the world’s largest producers of aluminum sheet for beverage can makers, and also owns a 60% stake in Logan Aluminum Inc. (Russellville, Kentucky, USA; Randy Schumaker, President), the operator of Logan Mill. Logan Mill is jointly owned with Novelis Corporation (Atlanta, Georgia, USA; Philip Martens, President & CEO; hereinafter “Novelis”). Both TAA and Novelis individually supply their own primary metal inputs to Logan Mill for processing and own and market their own share of output.

ITOCHU Group expects the acquisition to leverage its business activities, secure a presence in the North American and Latin American markets and accordingly enhance its strength in the global market.