Business Concentrates POLYMERS
▸ Merck KGaA widens its LCD offering Merck KGaA, the world’s top producer of liquid crystals used in displays, is strengthening its stake in the business. The German firm has signed a license agreement with the British firm Nanoco allowing Merck to produce cadmium-free quantum dots, which are used to enhance color in liquid crystal displays. Separately, Merck says it will spend $17 million to build a plant that
LyondellBasell plant to debut polymer process LyondellBasell Industries is moving forward with plans to build a high-density polyethylene (HDPE) plant on the U.S. Gulf Coast. The plant will have 500,000 metric tons of annual capacity when it opens in 2019 and be the first to use the company’s new Hyperzone technology. The process uses a twostage, gas-phase reactor that constructs a multimodal resin. The first stage, explains Dan Coombs, Lyondell’s executive vice president of global olefins and polyolefins technology, imparts processability by giving the polymer an optimal molecular weight. The second stage’s multizone reactor controls reaction conditions and the addition of comonomers. The company says Hyperzone technology offers improved stress crack resistance as well as a better balance between stiffness and impact strength than conventional HDPE. Target markets include pipe and blow-molded objects such as laundry detergent bottles. The company ultimately aims to license the technology.—ALEX TULLO
BIOBASED MATERIALS
▸ Lenzing boosts cellulosic fibers Merck researcher Harald Seibert studies the surface structure of an LCD substrate with an atomic force microscope. produces liquid crystal windows. In June 2014, Merck acquired Peer+, a Dutch firm specializing in such windows, which can be electrically activated to control external light.—JEAN-FRANÇOIS TREMBLAY
MERGERS AND ACQUISITIONS
▸ Alpek beefing up polyester presence Mexican chemical maker Alpek has made a small polyethylene terephthalate (PET) acquisition in Canada and may make a big one in Brazil. Alpek’s U.S. subsidiary, DAK Americas, has bought control of Selenis Canada, which operates a small PET plant in Montréal, from Portugal’s IMG Group. Meanwhile, Alpek is in exclusive negotiations to buy Petroquímica Suape, a PET complex in Pernambuco, Brazil, from Brazilian state oil company Petrobras. Opened in 2013 the complex makes PET, the PET raw material purified terephthalic acid, and polyester filament. Brazil’s economic downturn forced Petrobras to take a $1.1 billion write-down on the plants in 2014 and $200 million last year. —ALEX TULLO
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Lenzing is spending more than $110 million to expand its output of specialty cellulosic fibers in Heiligenkreuz and Lenzing, Austria. Scheduled to come online over the next two years, the 35,000 metric tons of annual capacity will satisfy growing demand, Lenzing says. Although most of the firm’s fibers are made from wood pulp, last month it launched a fiber made from recycled cotton fabric. Starting with cotton waste, Lenzing says, reduces the environmental impact of cellulosic fiber production.—MARC REISCH
BIOBASED CHEMICALS
▸ Energy Department funds bioproducts
recovering mixed methoxyphenols from biocrude.—MARC REISCH
BUSINESS
▸ Solvay adds capacity and exits a business Solvay plans to increase capacity for one business and divest another. At its Chicago Heights, Ill., plant, the firm is adding 10,000 metric tons of annual capacity for highly dispersible silica. The investment follows recent expansions in Poland, Brazil, and South Korea to supply customers of the fuel-saving tire additive. Separately, Solvay will sell its chlorine and peroxide derivatives site in Bussi sul Tirino, Italy, to the Italian firm Caffaro. Solvay says it will continue to market organic peroxides made there.—MARC REISCH
SPECIALTY CHEMICALS Three early-stage projects to advance biochemical and biofuel production have won up to $11.3 million, combined, from the U.S. Department of Energy. In one project, Dow Chemical, LanzaTech, and Northwestern University will develop a process for the bioconversion of biomass-derived syngas to C6-C14 fatty alcohols. Separately, Amyris will cooperate with Renmatix and Total New Energies on converting cellulosic sugar-based farnesene into consumer products and fuels. And Research Triangle Institute will partner with Arkema and engineering firm AECOM to investigate
▸ Innospec acquires Huntsman surfactants Innospec has agreed to acquire Huntsman Corp.’s European surfactants business for $225 million. Based in Belgium, the business has annual sales of around $230 million from plants in France, Italy, and Spain. Innospec says the purchase is in keeping with its desire to expand in the personal care sector. Huntsman says it is committed to its remaining surfactants businesses in
CREDIT: MERCK KGAA
MATERIALS
PHARMACEUTICAL CHEMICALS
the U.S. and Australia, which it describes as being backward integrated into essential feedstocks.—MICHAEL MCCOY
▸ Cambrex rides a wave to further expansion
EMPLOYMENT
▸ NewLink and Tokai will cut jobs Setbacks in late-stage cancer clinical trials have led to job cuts at NewLink Genetics and Tokai Pharmaceuticals. NewLink will cut about 100 jobs, or more than 40% of its staff, as it winds down work on the cellular immunotherapy algenpantucel-L, which failed to show any effect against pancreatic cancer. The firm will focus on developing its IDO pathway inhibitor, indoximod, in multiple cancers. Likewise, Tokai will reduce its workforce by about 60% to just 10 full-time employees. The company recently halted a Phase III prostate cancer trial of its small-molecule drug galeterone. The company says it will explore options for galeterone.—ANN THAYER
POLYMERS
▸ Chevron Phillips completes pilot unit Chevron Phillips Chemical has completed a polyethylene pilot plant at its R&D facility in Bartlesville, Okla. The plant is based on CP Chem’s MarTech technology, which is used in 80 polyethylene plants operating in
Chemical engineering intern Joshua Henderson in front of CP Chem’s new pilot plant. 16 countries. It will test new catalysts and polymers.—ALEX TULLO
PHARMACEUTICALS
▸ Takeda plans layoffs in R&D reorganization Takeda Pharmaceutical will eliminate an unspecified number of jobs as part of an R&D revamp. The company says it plans to centralize research in the U.S. and Japan, suggesting that its R&D center in the U.K., which employs 400, is threatened. Takeda’s research center in Shonan, Japan, on which it recently spent $1.8 billion, will concentrate on the central nervous system and regenerative medicine. The company also will continue to research vaccines, gastroenterology, and oncology. The layoffs and related restructuring will cost $740 million over the next two years, the firm anticipates.—JEAN-FRANÇOIS TREMBLAY
Business Roundup
CREDIT: CHEVRON PHILLIPS
▸ Celanese has ceased making monomethylamine in Cangrejera, Mexico, after a review determined that continued production was no longer a “viable business option.” The company has redirected monomethylamine equipment towards dimethylamine and trimethylamine. ▸ The Chemical Heritage Foundation has named former British Museum director Robert Anderson as its interim president. Predecessor Carsten Reinhardt, who headed CHF since 2013, is return-
ing to Germany and will be a history of science professor at Bielefeld University. ▸ Envergent Technologies, a joint venture of UOP and Ensyn, has begun building a facility in Port-Cartier, Quebec, that will make renewable fuels out of forest residues. The firm says fuels made with its RTP fast thermal conversion process have a carbon intensity that is 70% less than petroleum-based fuels. ▸ Sumitomo Chemical and Zeon Corp. are studying the
Following a $50 million expansion of its active pharmaceutical ingredients facility in Charles City, Iowa, earlier this year, fine chemicals maker Cambrex is already considering its next expansion at the site as well as improvements at plants in Sweden and Italy. The firm said on an earnings conference call that it expects to announce the projects, likely to cost about $20 million, by the end of the year. CEO Steven Klosk noted that the new capacity in Charles City is filling up quickly.—RICK MULLIN
ONCOLOGY
▸ Amgen strikes immunotherapy deal Amgen will pay Advaxis $40 million up front and buy $25 million in Advaxis stock for rights to the personalized cancer immunotherapy ADXS-NEO. The treatment is created by sequencing a patient’s healthy and cancer cells to identify neoepitopes, or markers on antigens, that are most likely to prompt an immune response. Advaxis then uses an engineered strain of bacteria to deliver neoepitope peptides directly into cells that tell the immune system to recognize and combat tumor cells. The companies expect to start the first clinical trials of ADXS-NEO next year.—LISA JARVIS
combination of their solution styrene-butadiene rubber businesses. A joint venture, the Japanese companies say, would accelerate new product development and enhance cost competitiveness. ▸ JSR will sell its line of Opstar coating materials, used primarily to impart anti-reflective properties to liquid crystal displays, to Arakawa Chemical Industries. The business has been struggling due to poor market conditions, JSR says. ▸ Avrobio has raised $25 million in its first formal round of funding. The cash will be
used to advance gene therapies for Fabry disease and acute myeloid leukemia. Avrobio inserts a new, functional copy of a faulty gene into a patient’s own stem cells, which are then given back to the patient. ▸ Evelo Biosciences will work with Mayo Clinic researchers on microbiome-based therapies for cancer. Using samples from patients, the partners will isolate and characterize cancer-associated bacteria that might be used to activate the immune system against cancer. Mayo Clinic has a financial interest in Evelo.
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