TOKYO -- Nippon Steel will offload as much as 200 billion yen ($1.85 billion) in assets through March 2021, going beyond its original sales plan to finance the acquisition of India's Essar Steel, Nikkei has learned. The sales will center on fixed assets, such as cross-shareholdings and land. The Japanese steelmaker had initially planned to sell 100 billion yen in assets in the three years through fiscal 2020 but decided to boost the amount after it closed in on that goal last year. "We intend to use [the capital] for things like the Essar acquisition," Executive Vice President Katsuhiro Miyamoto told Nikkei.