Mumbai, June 1 :    Mumbai, June 1:  Tata Steel is gearing up to bargain from a position of strength in the steel industry. The Rs 7,759-crore steel major today outlined plans to strike alliances with global steel makers for marketing finished steel products and for sourcing their raw material requirements. 'We've held talks with a few leading companies,' said R. C. Nandrajog, vice-president (finance), Tata Steel. 'A number of alignments are possible,' he added, but declined to reveal names of the companies involved in the deliberations. The trend towards alignments has picked up in the global steel industry mainly due to the long recession experienced by the industry. The steel mega corp NKK and Posco of South Korea have successfully worked out a neat arrangement between themselves, as have companies in Japan and the US. Nandrajog clarified that Tata Steel is holding talks on its own and no other Indian company is currently involved in the deliberations. Analysts say this is the first time that a domestic steel producer is even harbouring thoughts of an alliance in an industry which is passing through a prolonged bear phase with prices close to the bottom of what steel industry circles call the 'death valley.' Analysts claim these steps will help the company not only to increase realisations but also to cut costs and fulfil Tisco chief JJ Irani's dream of bringing down the cost of steel to $ 150 from $ 220. According to Nandrajog, the benefits arising out of such alliances are tremendous. 'We can realise better prices while talking to global car majors like Ford, General Motors, the auto industry being one of the largest customers of steel, if we are together.' For example, he said, in view of the logistics involved, many US steel producers may want to farm out their purchase orders received from Indian subsidiaries of US auto companies to Tata Steel. He pointed out such alliances come in handy even for sourcing raw material requirements. For instance, Broken Hill Proprietary, the Australian coal mining conglomerate, supplies almost 40 per cent of the coal requirements to steel industry. To break the strangle hold that BHP has in the industry, it is better for companies to join hands and negotiate from a point of strength. However, while Tata Steel is in talks with other steel producers, he could not specify any time frame for the alliances to reach fruition. Meanwhile, the company will shortly exercise its call option on the debentures, which will involve a payment of Rs 700 crore to its debenture holders. The entire funds will be generated through internal accruals.