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He started off running the family commodity trading business and is now a global steel magnet, but who is Sanjeev Gupta?

The 49-year-old businessman was born in Punjab, India, where his father was an industrialist who owned a number of businesses including Victor Cycles.

At 12 he was sent to a boarding school at Canterbury, Kent, spending a gap year selling Victor bicycles in Turkey after A-levels.

Then he went to Trinity College, Cambridge, to study economics and management. While at university he set up a commodities trading business called Liberty House, using his student halls of residence flat as his office.

This got him into trouble with the university authorities when he used the address for a VAT claim, breaching the university's charitable status. He was hauled up in front a panel of dons who told him he had to leave the residences.

But he continued to run the business from his new digs and went on to graduate with a 2:1.

Since 1992 Mr Gupta has grown GFG Alliance into a fully integrated steel and mining business with a global presence in 12 countries, employing more than 35,000 people. GFC Alliance is a an international group of businesses that includes Liberty House Group, Simec Group, Wyelands financial services, and Jahama Estates.

Liberty Steel employs around 3,000 workers at 11 sites across the º£½ÇÊÓƵ.

Liberty is best known in Wales for buying the former Alphasteel works in Newport in 2013, and re-opening production there as other steel plants around the country were closing down or being sold.

In 2016 Liberty was one of a number of bidders for Tata’s º£½ÇÊÓƵ steel business before the sales process was abandoned. At that time Tata Steel º£½ÇÊÓƵ employed 8,000 in Wales and around 4,000 at its primary steelmaking operation at Port Talbot

It was in that year Liberty bought the Tredegar Steelworks when its former owner Caparo went into administration. Liberty resumed the production of steel structural hollow sections and tubes at the plant. The site, which included a 100,000 tonnes a year rolling mill, was one of a number of former Caparo Steel Products sites acquired by Liberty from the administrators in late 2015.

At that stage Liberty’s acquisitions and investments were said to have saved more than 1,500 British jobs directly and thousands more in the supply chain.

In Scotland, that year, Liberty acquired a hydro-power and aluminium smelting operation at Lochaber and purchased the Lochaber smelter and other assets from Rio Tinto Alcan for £330m.

Also in Scotland Mr Gupta's company bought Tata's two rolling mills at Clydebridge and Dalzell in Scotland, facilitated by a temporary 'nationalisation' by the Scottish Government.

It was also in 2016 he purchased Tungsten Bank. Mr Gupta renamed it Wyelands Bank, after his country house estate Wyelands he owns near Chepstow.

In 2017 Liberty acquired Tata’s Speciality Steels division and Caparo Merchant Bar, it purchased the Hartlepool SAW pipe mills from TATA, as well as the º£½ÇÊÓƵ operations of AMTEK and the fully integrated steel producer OneSteel in Australia.

The following two years saw Liberty entered the North American market with the acquisition of the Georgetown steelworks and Export Metals in Tampa, USA. As well the purchase on KCI, the leading wire rod producer in the USA, and Johnstown Wire Technologies.

Back in Europe it acquired seven steelworks in Europe from ArcelorMittal.

Last year, in India, Liberty acquired Adhunik Metaliks and Zion Steel. In Europe it bought the French steel assets of former British Steel's French rail business in Hayange and the Ascoval steelworks.

Liberty also announced job cuts at º£½ÇÊÓƵ steelmaking plants and Wyelands Bank was put under º£½ÇÊÓƵ regulatory scrutiny over GFG loan issues.

Towards the end of 2020 Liberty's parent company GFG Alliance created a new global advisory board.

The board was tasked with guiding the company in delivering its strategic priorities to achieving best practice in environment, social and governance, particularly towards its carbon neutral 2030 target. Former First Minister Carwyn Jones was named as one of the new board members.

The board appointments followed the consolidation of its businesses into three industry brands: Liberty Steel Group, Alvance Aluminium Group and Simec Energy Group.

It was at this time Mr Gupta said he would consider an acquisition if the Port Talbot steelworks was brought to market, and the company made a non-binding indicative offer for the steel activities of German conglomerate Thyssenkrupp.

Liberty said it believed a possible combination with Thyssenkrupp Steel would create a strong group that would well positioned to tackle the challenges faced by the European steel industry and accelerate the transformation to green steel production.

The bid for ThyssenKrupp was called off in February this year.