Business Concentrates INVESTMENT
▸ Solvay divests acetate and vinyls Solvay will sell its business in cellulose acetate tow, a fiber used to make cigarette filters, to the private equity firm Blackstone in a deal worth $1.1 billion. The business, called Solvay Acetow, generated nearly $600 million in sales in 2015. It employs 1,300 workers and operates plants in Brazil, France, Germany, Russia, and the U.S. Separately, Solvay has agreed to sell its 59% stake in the Thai polyvinyl chloride producer Vinythai to Asahi Glass in a deal that values the firm at about $465 million. Solvay earlier sold its European PVC business and is selling its Brazilian PVC business.—ALEX TULLO
Evonik builds up silica Evonik Industries is moving into the specialty silica field with the $630 million purchase of J.M. Huber Corp.’s silica operations. Separately, Evonik plans to build a $120 million precipitated silica plant near Charleston, S.C., to supply nearby tire makers with the additive. The purchase of the Huber business will take Evonik, which now makes silica mostly for industrial applications, into silica for consumer products such as toothpaste. With operations in the U.S., China, and India, the Huber business will have sales of about $300 million and operating income of about $60 million this year, the companies say. The deal is expected to close in the second half of 2017. The new Charleston plant, meanwhile, will supply tire manufacturers with an additive that can cut auto fuel consumption by up to 8%, Evonik says. It is slated to open in 2018.—MARC REISCH
its first plant earlier this year, says its products compete with meal from wild-caught fish.—MELODY BOMGARDNER
a University of Oxford spin-off, raised $21 million from Statoil Energy Ventures and others to scale up its perovskite-based technology. Perovskite materials share a crystal structure that could help make inexpensive solar cells. The firm has a pilot line in Germany and a development agreement with a major solar manufacturer. Separately, Sweden’s Exeger has raised $5.5 million from the European energy firm Fortum to scale up production of printable, dye-sensitized solar cells for use in consumer electronics and buildings.—MELODY BOMGARDNER
SPECIALTY CHEMICALS
INVESTMENT
▸ Lenzing will build U.S. fiber plant
▸ AkzoNobel forms venture in India
Lenzing, an Austrian maker of cellulosic fibers, plans to spend almost $300 million to build a plant in Mobile, Ala., for its Tencel brand fiber. The 90,000-metric-tonper-year facility, the largest in the world, is set to open in early 2019. Tencel is used in apparel, home furnishing, nonwoven, and other applications. Between the new plant and expansion projects in Austria and England, Tencel capacity will increase by more than 50% by 2019, Lenzing says.—MICHAEL MCCOY
AkzoNobel and India’s Atul will build a 32,000-metric-ton-per-year monochloroacetic acid (MCAA) plant in the state of Gujarat, India. Atul, which will supply chlorine and hydrogen to the facility, uses MCAA to produce the herbicide 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D). AkzoNobel is not the first European chemical firm to invest in Indian MCAA production. In 2008, CABB Chemicals bought a majority stake in Karnavati Rayasan, currently India’s largest MCAA producer.—JEAN-FRANÇOIS TREMBLAY
SOLAR POWER
3-D PRINTING
▸ Sun shines on new solar technologies
▸ Chew on this: 3-D printed gum
Two solar-cell start-ups have raised funds from investors. Oxford Photovoltaics,
Wacker Chemie, a maker of polyvinyl acetate chewing gum bases, has devel-
SPECIALTY CHEMICALS
▸ Edgewater buys a pair of firms Following on plans to purchase BASF’s inorganic specialties business, the private equity firm Edgewater Capital Partners is buying two specialty chemical businesses. From Ensign-Bickford Industries, it is getting DanChem Technologies, a Danville, Va.-based contract manufacturer that boasts the sector’s largest fleet of horizontal reactors, used in difficult and hazardous reactions. And an Edgewater-owned company, FAR Chemical, has acquired the acetylacetonate business of Mackenzie Chemicals. Mackenzie has been making acetylacetonates, used as catalysts, curing agents, and urethane crosslinkers, in Bush, La., since 1977.—ALEX TULLO
AGRICULTURE
▸ Start-up gets funds for novel protein South Africa’s AgriProtein has raised $17.5 million from investors to recycle discarded food into protein for aquaculture and other livestock businesses. AgriProtein grinds up discarded food and turns it into a paste, which is fed to larvae of the black soldier fly. After they mature, the larvae are separated from the waste and processed into protein meal and oil for animal feed. The company, which opened
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C&EN | CEN.ACS.ORG | DECEMBER 12/19, 2016
A black soldier fly, parent to protein-rich larvae.
CREDIT: BLACKSOLDIERFLYBLOG.COM
MERGERS & ACQUISITIONS
Wacker’s new take on gum. oped what it calls the world’s first three-dimensional printing process for chewing gum. To keep from gumming up the works, Wacker developed a polymer formula that can be printed in personalized shapes using special software and hardware.—MARC REISCH
INORGANIC CHEMICALS
▸ Wacker will add pyrogenic silica
CREDIT: WACKER CHEMIE (GUM); NURITAS (U2)
Wacker Chemie plans to spend $150 million to build a pyrogenic silica plant at its facility in Charleston, Tenn. Set to open in the first half of 2019, the plant will have annual capacity of about 13,000 metric tons and create about 50 jobs. As raw material, Wacker will use tetrachlorosilane produced as a by-product at the Charleston site’s polysilicon plant, a $2.5 billion facility that opened earlier this year. Wacker sites in Germany are similarly integrated. The new product is a high-purity silicon dioxide used in elastomers, paints, food, and personal care products.—MICHAEL MCCOY
ECONOMY
▸ New York City spends on life sciences New York City will spend $500 million in an effort to create 16,000 jobs in the life sciences and related fields. Speaking at the Alexandria Center, a research campus that opened in 2011 in Manhattan, Mayor Bill de Blasio said the plan centers on a $100 million facility in the neighborhood or across the East River in Long Island City, Queens. It includes $50 million to expand operations at nonprofit research facilities in the city and $10 million to expand business incubators. The city is also committing $300 million in tax incentives in the hope of attracting investment in commercial lab space for life science businesses.—RICK MULLIN
FOOD INGREDIENTS
▸ Bono and The Edge back healthy peptides U2’s Bono is a fixture of rock music and philanthropy. He’s also an experienced investor in technology start-ups. He and bandmate The Edge have invested an undisclosed amount in Nuritas, a Dublin-based start-up that discovers peptide-based ingredients for use in nutraceuticals and cosmetics. The company finds its products by mining libraries of billions of food-derived
Two U2 members are backing the Irish start-up Nuritas. molecules. It looks for peptides with anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, and antiaging properties.—MELODY BOMGARDNER
NUCLEIC ACIDS
▸ Purdue licenses Exicure drug Purdue Pharma has formed a pact with Exicure, a biotech firm developing “spherical nucleic acid” technology, which facilitates intracellular delivery of nucleic acids by tethering them to the surface of a nanoparticle. In exchange for an undisclosed payment and equity investment, Exicure will grant Purdue rights to its lead compound, AST-005, a topically applied treatment for psoriasis that has completed a Phase I study. Exicure is based on technology developed in the labs of Northwestern University chemist Chad Mirkin.—LISA JARVIS
Business Roundup
total investment in the company to about $440 million.
▸ Nantero, a Boston-area start-up, has raised $21 million to bring carbon-nanotube-based computer memory to market in consumer electronics and other products. The firm has raised $110 million to date from Globespan Capital Partners and others.
▸ Goldfinch Bio has been launched by the venture capital firm Third Rock Ventures. Armed with $55 million in Series A funding, Cambridge, Mass.-based Goldfinch will pursue new treatments for kidney diseases based on the discoveries of its scientific founders.
▸ Molecular Assemblies, a San Diego-based start-up developing enzyme-based DNA synthesis, has raised $2.3 million in a first round of funding from Agilent Technologies and other investors. The firm says its biocatalyst route is greener and makes longer DNA sequences than
traditional phosphoramidite chemical methods. ▸ Amyris will sell half of its squalane business to the Japanese specialty chemical firm Nikkol for up to $20 million. The two companies will then establish a cosmetic ingredients joint venture. Nikkol already distributes Amyris products in Japan. ▸ Oxford Nanopore Technology, a U.K. firm that designs portable DNA/RNA sequencers, has raised $126 million from private investors to fund its expansion, particularly in Asia. The funding round brings
▸ Bayer and Versant Ventures have invested $225 million to launch BlueRock Therapeutics. The Canadian company plans to develop induced pluripotent stem cell therapies for cardiovascular and neurodegenerative disorders. Its technology is based
on the work of Nobel Prize winner Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University. ▸ Ixchelsis, a U.K. start-up, has raised $12 million from Pfizer Ventures to advance Phase IIb clinical trials of IX01, an oxytocin antagonist that treats premature ejaculation. IX-01 was discovered by Pfizer. ▸ Evotec and Forge Therapeutics will develop small molecules that block LpxC, a Gram-negative antibacterial target. Evotec will optimize LpxC inhibitors discovered using Forge’s metal-binding pharmacophore library. Forge was spun out of the labs of University of California, San Diego, chemist Seth Cohen.
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