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The steel plants in Aviles/Gijon arose from two different steel companies of which ENSIDESA (Empresa Nacional Siderúrgia Sociedad Anónima) in Aviles  is the older one.

It was founded in 1950 under the Franco regime by the Spanish government to modernise the underdeveloped Spanish steel industry. Until 1970 ten coke oven batteries, four blast furnaces, three open hearth shops, two BOF shops and four hot rolling mills were built.

The Gijon site dates back to the early 1960ies when the privatly owned  UNINSA (Union de Siderurgias Asturianas S.A.) was founded and started to built an integrated steel mill north of Gijon in 1966.

With the help of the Krupp company from Germany two coke oven batteries, two blast furnaces, a BOF steel making plant and four hot rolling mills were installed. Exhausted by this investment the UNINSA had to be  taken over by the government and was fusioned with the nearby ENSIDESA in 1973.

In the 1980ies a new two-converter BOF steel making plant was built in Aviles replacing the existing open hearth and BOF shops in Aviles.

In 1991 the ENSIDESA merged with the Basque AHV (Altos Hornos Vizkaya) to form the new CSI (Corporación Siderúrgica Integral).

In the 1990ies the  blast furnaces in Aviles and Sestao (former AHV) were closed down and the hot metal production was concentrated in Gijon.

In 1997 CSI was privatized and renamed ACERALIA. In 2001 ACERALIA merged with ARBED (Luxemburg) and USINOR (France) to form the world's largest steel company ARCELOR. In 2006 ARCELOR was taken over by MITTAL to form ARCELORMITTAL.

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