The Chemical World This Week
A P R I L I O, I 9 s 1
7SSSL CONCENTRATES • Firestone and General Tire are exchanging law suits over General's patent on tire treads made of oil-extended rubber (U.S. 2,964,083). Last week General filed an infringement suit against Firestone in U.S. District Court in Cleveland. Four days before, Firestone and a small Pennsylvania tire maker, McCreary Tire & Rubber, asked U.S. District Court in Baltimore to void the patent and declare them entitled to a royalty-free license. General sued U.S. Rubber and Goodyear for infringement last year after it won the patent (C&EN, Dec. 19, 1960, page 21). General asks a royalty of 3 / 8 cent per pound of the rubber, which could bring it $3 to $4 million a year in royalties. Firestone claims it got a royalty-free license to the patent when it bought the Government's synthetic rubber plant at Lake Charles, La. • Britain's Grange Chemicals will make phthalic anhydride from o-xylene in a 15,000 ton-a-year unit. The petroleum-derived o-xylene will be produced by BP-California, Ltd., jointly owned by British Petroleum Co. and California Chemical (whose Oronite division makes phthalic anhydride from o-xylene in this country). BPCalifornia will produce the o-xylene in an aromatics plant which it will build at British Petroleum's refinery in Kent (C&EN, Oct. 17, 1960, page 29). Grange Chemicals is a subsidiary of British Hydrocarbon Chemicals. California Chemical also owns one third of Grange. • American Cyanamid plans to purchase Wasco Chemical Co., Cambridge, Mass., a producer and distributor of cast methyl methacrylate plastic sheets and other cast plastic products for the construction industry. Cyanamid will exchange an undisclosed number of its common shares for Wasco about May 1. Wasco's operations should strengthen Cyanamid's position in methyl methacrylates. Cyanamid hopes to have a 25 to 30 million pound-per-year methyl methacrylate monomer plant in production at Fortier, La., early in 1963. It also plans a plant to convert the monomer into molding powder and cast sheet. • Users of phenol are breathing a bit easier this week, now that part of last year's price increase has been erased. Dow clipped 1/2 cent from its phenol schedule, lowering the tank car price to 17 cents a pound. Monsanto says it will meet the new price. Last fall, Monsanto led a 1-cent increase which many phenol users found hard to
absorb. U.S. production of synthetic phenol came to about 725 million pounds in 1960. Output this year may be slightly lower because of the business recession. • Du Pont plans to build a 30 million gallon-peryear methanol plant near Huron, Ohio. Construction will start in late 1961, with completion set for late 1962 or early 1963. However, construction depends upon the Federal Power Commission's approval of a pipeline extension to provide the plant with natural gas. The new plant is in addition to Du Pont's earlier plan to expand its methanol capacity by more than 35% (C&EN, Jan. 30, page 27). ^ Spencer Chemical is holding merger talks with Southern Oxygen Co., Bladensburg, Md. The negotiations, under way for several months, look promising, Spencer president John C. Denton says. Spencer, whose sales totaled $74 million in the year ended June 30,1960, makes liquid and gaseous carbon dioxide, argon, and ammonia, as well as other chemicals. Southern Oxygen (sales reached $12.2 million in the year ended Sept. 30, 1960) makes a complete line of compressed gases and has been distributing Spencer's argon since 1959. • Privately owned Stein, Hall & Co. will go public through a proposed sale of 250,000 shares of common stock by present shareowners. The offering, which will be handled by an underwriting group headed by F. Eberstadt & Co., will leave two thirds of the company's 751,580 shares outstanding in the hands of present owners. Stein, Hall earned $878,000 ($1.17 a share) last year on sales of $56.8 million, up from a net income of $735,000 (98 cents a share) on sales of $59.3 million in 1959. The New York based firm makes synthetic resins, gum derivatives, adhesives, and food stabilizers, also sells starches and starch derivatives. • Greece has agreed to become an associate member of the European Common Market.
However, the agreement still has to go through a long process of ratification and isn't expected to go into effect before July 1, 1961. The association will take the form of a customs union between Greece and ECM and will allow Greece an initial 12-year tariff transition period. ECM has also agreed to loan Greece $125 million during the first five years of the association. APRIL
10,
1961
C&EN
17
