Business Concentrates INVESTMENT SPECIALTY CHEMICALS
▸ AkzoNobel, Axalta end merger talks For the second time this year, AkzoNobel has halted a merger with another paint maker. The Dutch company broke off merger talks with Axalta Coatings Systems, the former coatings business of DuPont, after Axalta received a competing offer from Japan’s Nippon Paint. AkzoNobel’s coatings sales are about $10 billion per year; Axalta’s are $4 billion. AkzoNobel says it still plans to separate its chemicals business. Earlier this year, it fought off a takeover attempt by U.S. rival PPG Industries. PPG walked away in June, but under Dutch law, it may again bid for AkzoNobel next month.—ALEX TULLO
Corporations pledge aid to chemical start-ups New chemical ventures don’t make money for their investors nearly as often as start-ups in life sciences and software do. To correct that imbalance, corporations need to step up and support young chemistry-related university spin-offs, David Bem, PPG Industries’ chief technology officer, said at a conference for entrepreneurs. A start-up whose technologies align with PPG’s interests might leverage a relationship with the paint maker to gain market and technology improvement insights, Bem said. Such a partnership could improve the value of the smaller firm’s business before it starts to raise funding in earnest. Bem spoke at the ACS Entrepreneur Summit, held in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 14–15. ACS publishes C&EN. Chemical firms should set up start-up incubators, he suggested, like Google and Johnson & Johnson and other health care firms have. Others attending the summit, including executives from Procter & Gamble, Evonik Industries, Mitsui Chemicals, and Waters Corp., also endorsed the value of outside innovators to their businesses. Gerard Baillely, P&G’s vice president of R&D, said, “We need entrepreneurs to help guide us to success.”—MARC REISCH
PETROCHEMICALS
Ineos has signed an agreement to supply U.S. ethane to China’s SP Chemicals under a long-term contract. To fulfill the agreement, Ineos will build what it calls the world’s largest ethane carrier ship, able to carry up to 95,000 m3 of the gas per trip.
batteries to be used in electric vehicles. SiNode is developing silicon graphene anode materials that promise to make higher-capacity, faster-charging batteries than the lithium-ion batteries in use today. Using its in-house expertise, PPG will prepare and help scale up production of graphene for SiNode.—MARC REISCH
AGRICULTURE
▸ Yara will buy Brazilian fertilizer plant Ineos already ships U.S. ethane to its own ethylene crackers in Europe. The gas will supply a 650,000-metric-tonper-year ethylene cracker that SP is building in Taixing in the eastern province of Jiangsu. The cracker is scheduled to open in 2019.—JEAN-FRANÇOIS TREMBLAY
ENERGY STORAGE
Norwegian fertilizer maker Yara has agreed to purchase a Brazilian fertilizer plant, Vale Cubatão Fertilizantes, for $255 million from the mining firm Vale. The plant, in Cubatão, Brazil, makes nitrogen and phosphate fertilizers. It generated revenues of $413 million and earnings of $30 million in 2016. The plant was left out of the U.S. firm Mosaic’s $2.5 billion purchase of Vale Fertilizantes, which is still pending nearly a year after the companies inked the agreement.—ALEX TULLO
3-D PRINTING
▸ PPG partners with battery materials maker ▸ Dow Chemical unveils printing materials PPG Industries will partner with start-up SiNode Systems to help commercialize high-energy anode materials for lithium-ion
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C&EN | CEN.ACS.ORG | NOVEMBER 27, 2017
Dow Chemical launched its EVOLV3D line of three-dimensional printing mate-
rials at the FormNext 2017 trade show in Frankfurt, Germany, earlier this month. The first product is EVOLV3D USM, a support material used in extrusion-based 3-D printing. The material is meant to support overhangs, preventing them from collapsing while a part is being printing. EVOLV3D USM is then dissolved in water when the printing process is finished. Dow is also developing a liquid silicone rubber for 3-D printing.—ALEX TULLO
CONSUMER PRODUCTS
▸ Linde helps keep Macy’s parade afloat Continuing a “noble” 23-year tradition, Linde supplied helium gas for the iconic Thanksgiving Day Parade in Manhattan last week. The German firm supplied roughly 8,500 m3 of the noble gas for the parade’s 45 balloons. The gas originated at Linde’s plant in Otis, Kan., which refines crude he-
A Spider-Man balloon at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade.
C R E D I T: I NEO S ( S H I P ) ; S H UT T E RSTO C K ( S P I D E R-M A N )
▸ Ineos supplies U.S. shale gas to China
