BUSINESS
CONCENTRATES Danisco shuffles production, R&D Danisco is closing a plant and reorganizing its R&D efforts
in the wake of its April acquisition of the enzymes producer Genencor. The Danish food ingredientsfirmwill close a Genencor enzymes facility in Beloit, Wis., that employs about 100 people. Half of the employees will be offered jobs at other Danisco/Genencor sites, including Cedar Rapids, Iowa, where most of the plant's output will be shifted. The shutdown of the plant, which Genencor obtained in its 2002 acquisition ofEnzyme BioSystems, will be complete by the end of 2007, the firm says. At the same time, Danisco is merging its R&D organization with that of Genencor under a "center of excellence" model. Danisco R&D locations in Brabrand and Copenhagen, Denmark, will focus on the food and feed markets, while Genencor sites in Leiden, the Netherlands, and Palo Alto, Calif, will concentrate on industrial enzymes. About 26 positions will be eliminated across the four sites, the company says.
Almatis will change hands
Companies in the index are derived from the Dow Jones index of the 2,500 largest public companies.
The private investment firm
Investcorp has agreed to acquire Almatis, the former Alcoa Specialty Chemicals, for an undisclosed sum. The sellers are Rhone Capital and Ontario Teachers' Private Capital, also private investors, who acquired Almatis from aluminum maker Alcoa in February 2004 for $342 million. The price of the new deal is not being disclosed. Separately, Engelhard has purchased Almatis AC, the former adsorbents and catalyst business of Almatis. The deal includes facilities in Port Allen andVidalia,La.
Sustainability index revised The Dow Jones Sustainability World Index, a stock index that tracks companies meeting economic, environmental, and social performance criteria, will add three chemical companies and drop two. As of Sept. 19, the index of about 300 companies will add Akzo Nobel, Ciba Specialty Chemicals, and Hitachi Chemical. Coming off are Dow Chemical andTeijin. U
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Nova to make resin in China Nova Chemicals has entered
a long-term pact with Loyal Chemical Industrial Corp. to make Arcel brand moldable foam resin near Shanghai. The agreement is part of Nova's plan to boost capacity for the expandable polystyrene-polyethylene "interpolymer" to 100 million lb per year by the end of 2006. Construction of a new facility is under way and is expected to be complete in early 2006. Arcel is currently made at Nova's Beaver Valley site near Pittsburgh.
AMRI stock takes a hit Contract research firm Albany Molecular Research Inc. saw its stock drop 23% to $12.99 per share last Tuesday following the announcement that Barr Pharmaceuticals and Teva Pharmaceutical Industries plan to launch a generic version of Sanofi-Aventis, al-
lergy drug Allegra. AMRI holds the patent on fexofenadine, Allegra's active ingredient. Bank of America Securities analyst Frank H. Pinkerton writes that Allegra royalties netted AMRI $43 million in 2004 and had been expected to reach $47 million in 2005. He now expects royalties for this year to total $40 million. Sanofi has filed patent-infringement lawsuits against both Barr and Teva that are not expected to be settled until next year.
LG claims a new route to color filters
to apply the gene-silencing technology RNA interference (RNAi) in drug discovery Novartis will pay Alnylam $56.8 million, consisting of cash and the purchase of 19.9% of the firm's stock. If Novartis integrates Alnylam's technology into its drug discovery platform, Alnylam will be eligible for royalties on products resulting from those efforts. Alnylam will continue developing its own pipeline of RNAi therapeutics while giving Novartis the right offirstoffer for those drug candidates.
EpiCept buying Maxim Pharma
LG Chem has developed
EpiCept Corp. is acquiring
what it says is a simpler process for making colorfiltersfor liquid-crystal displays (LCDs). By spraying ink directly on a glass plate, the company claims it can reduce the number ofmanufacturing steps from 16 to on-
Maxim Pharmaceuticals for $136 million in stock. The firm, which is keeping the EpiCept name, will focus on pain management and oncology drugs. EpiCept CEO Jack V. Talley will remain in place, as will thefirm'sNewjersey headquarters. EpiCept says it will continue to operate Maxim's research facility in San Diego. EpiCept shareholders will retain approximately 72% of the merged company's stock.
ly three. Color filters are one of the most expensive components in an LCD, accounting for 20% of the total cost, according to LG. Manufacturers like Sumitomo Chemical have spent hundreds of millions of dollars to build color filter plants. LG isn't saying whether it plans to license the process or build its own facilities.
Novartis and Alnylam ally on RNAi drugs Novartis and Alnylam are
beginning a three-year alliance
Ranbaxy to sell noncore units India's Ranbaxy Labor?*
lies will sell businesses in mal health,finechemicals, and diagnostics to ICICI Venture Funds Private, an Indian private equity investor. Meanwhile, clinical diagnostics supplier Dade Behring Holdings, Deerfield, 111., will acquire aRanbaxy unit that has been distributing Dade Behring's products and services in India. Ranbaxy expects to complete the deals by the end of the year. The businesses involved accounted for about 2.5% of the company's $1.3 billion in sales in its latest WWW.CEN-0NLINE.ORG
fiscal year, a spokesman says. Ranbaxy CEO Brian W Tempest says the divestments are in line with thefirm'sgoal of becoming an international research-based pharmaceutical company
tegRex technology which eliminates the solid-state step in PET manufacture. The company says it is considering another IntegRex-based PET plant in North America to open in 2009.
from July but down 5,700 from August of last year. Meanwhile, the ranks of production workers took a big hit, falling 2,900 from July and 11,700 from the comparable month in 2004.
Syngenta names Akzo to build new chairman plant in Russia
LG-Dow hikes polycarbonate
Heinz Imhoff, chairman of
Akzo Nobel will expand its
Syngenta since it was formed in 2000 from the merger of Novartis and Zeneca agrochemicalbusi4&0L nesses, has stepped #ff ^jf down for health jf a^M reasons at the age < w^i of63.Thecompa| $&j ny has tapped Mar- ^ w ^ tinTaylor, current- ^& ^ H lyvice chairman, to ^ K J a take over as nonex- • M T I ecutive chairman. Taylor Taylor, 53, has been on the Syngenta board of directors since the company was created. He has headed Courtaulds' textile division and the British bank Barclays. Separately Syngenta plans to move its international business unit from Dielsdorf to Basel, both in Switzerland. Some 30 jobs will be lost in the shift.
powder coatings operations to Russia. Thefirmrecendy broke _ 0 ground for a new facilik r l ? ity in Orekhovo-ZueWk **? vo, about 60 miles east • R I of Moscow, from HP £ which it will supply WB powder coatings to W customers in Russia ^^m and countries such as f^H Ukraine and Belarus. •H Although Akzo has been supplying customers in the region for some time, the $11 million facility, expected to begin production in the second quarter of 2006, will make available a local source ofthe durable heatfusible coatings.
The South Korean polycarbonate joint venture of LG Chem and Dow Chemical will spend about $100 million to double capacity to 130,000 metric tons per year at its site in Yeosu, South Korea. Dow says basic design work on the new plant is done and that construction will be completed in less than two years. The company adds that infrastructure for the line is already in place because the partners anticipated the expansion. LG Dow Polycarbonate started operations in 2001.
Eastman sees progress, PET At a meeting with analysts
in New York City last week, Eastman Chemical CEO Brian J. Ferguson touted the firm's financial progress, highlighting a 30% reduction in debt and a 130% increase in operating income since the beginning of the year. "Eastman is hitting on all cylinders," he said. Ferguson noted that construction of a 350,000-metric-ton-per-year polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plant in Columbia, S.C., is on schedule for completion in the first quarter of2007. The plant is based on Eastman's InWWW.CEN-0NLINE.ORG
Employment edges up U.S. chemical employment
increased slightly in August from the previous month, according to the latest data from the Labor Department, but continued to slide compared with year-earlier figures. The seasonally adjusted Employment, thousands 8901
1
Mexican chief pushes Phoenix Mexican President Vicente
Fox has announced revamped plans for the Phoenix petrochemical project. Instead of anticipating a major new chemical joint venture between Pemex, Nova Chemicals, and local partners costing nearly $2 billion, the government now has in mind $850 million in small projects and plant upgrades, according to the Mexican news agency Notimex. Plans call for a 45% increase in ethylene capacity at Pemex facilities in Cangrejera and Morelos by 2009, and for a new aromatics complex in Altamiraby2010. Nova cautions that plans for the projects are notfinal.'We are aware of the revised proposal and are working with our partners to respond to it," a Nova spokeswoman says.
BUSINESS ROUNDUP • Diosynth will develop a
• DuPont will build a plant for
process for producing VTR-576, an HlV-inhibiting peptide developed by the German firm Viro Pharmaceuticals. Diosynth says it will employ proprietary technology that combines liquid- and solid-phase peptide synthesis.
nitrogen trifluoride, a chambercleaning gas used by electronics makers, at its site in Changshu, Jiangsu Province, China. The plant will have capacity of 450 metric tons per year when it opens in 2007, DuPont says. • DSM has opened an R&D
• Rhodia has sold its phosphates and sulfuric acid businesses in Rieme, Belgium, to Misa Inc. The sale is another step in Rhodia's withdrawal from the phosphates business.
885 P N ^ -
center in Shanghai that will initially support the firm's nutritional products, food specialties, and NeoResins businesses. Separately, DSM will open a joint lab with Fudan University later this month.
• Wyeth has opened what it 880
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/ T T . . . .1 A S O N D J F M A M J J A •—2004 —' l 2005 '
government numbers show chemical employment in August totaled 880,100, up 700
calls the world's largest integrated biotechnology facility in South County Dublin, Ireland. Built at a cost of close to $2 billion, the facility will make drugs such as the arthritis treatment Enbrel and the new antibiotic Tygacil.
• Fuji Photo Film will lay off
about 100 people when it integrates two chemical plants in Kanagawa, near Tokyo, that make development chemicals, photosensitive materials for color film, and plastics used to makeflat-paneldisplays.
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