MERGERS:
BASF in Wyandotte Is another major foreign takeover in the making? This was the question buzzing back and forth through the industry last week, following Wyandotte Chemicals' announcement that West Germany's BASF has been buying up Wyandotte shares. Earlier this summer BP Oil Corp., the principal U.S. subsidiary of British Petroleum, and Standard Oil (Ohio) revealed plans to merge. Now definitive agreements have been approved by the two companies and Sohio shareholders will vote on the merger at a special meeting in Cleveland on Oct. 9. So far BASF has about 10% of Wyandotte's outstanding shares, president Robert B. Semple told shareholders in a letter advising them of the development. However, BASF has indicated that it plans to further increase its holding in the Michiganheadquartered industrial and specialty chemicals producer by buying up to 25 to 30% of the firm's shares— "provided such purchases can be made within the general levels of current market prices." Certainly the market price has been favorable of late for buyers like BASF, what with Wyandotte's woeful earnings performance. The firm recently reported a net loss for the second straight quarter. For the first six months of 1969, Wyandotte earnings losses were $295,000 or 9 cents a share, compared to earnings gains of $921,000 or 32 cents in the like period 1968. Sales, meanwhile, continued to set records, reaching $72.2 million for the first half. As for the why behind the move, Mr. Semple says that BASF has indicated it bought Wyandotte shares "looking towards potential commercial relationships and as an investment." Wyandotte produces intermediates and basic products such as chlorine and caustic soda. A close tie-in with Wyandotte would thus give BASF a raw materials base it doesn't now have in the U.S. In addition, Wyandotte is the largest U.S. producer of polyols for urethanes and also makes toluene diisocyanate. BASF doesn't produce polyurethanes in the U.S. but entered the business in Europe earlier this summer (C&EN, June 30, page 17). BASF's operations in the U.S. include two 100%-owned subsidiariesBASF Corp. in New York and BASF Computron in Bedford, Mass.—and a 50-50 joint venture with Dow Chemical, Dow Badische in Williamsburg, Va. BASF Corp. produces foamed polystyrene, dyes, auxiliaries and finishing agents, and polymer dispersions. BASF Computron makes computer tapes for electronic data processing 6 C&EN AUG. 18, 1969
THE CHEMICAL
WORLD THIS WEEK
machines; Dow Badische products include acrylic acid, acrylates, butanols, caprolactam, polycaprolactam, and man-made fibers. Will Wyandotte resist the BASF invasion? The company won't say now what it plans to do. A large chunk of Wyandotte stock—enough to prevent anyone gaining control of the firm—is owned by the descendants of the founder of the company, Capt. J. B. Ford. Also, there may be a hint in the fact that Mr. Semple's letter to the shareowners adds that "certain substantial U.S. companies have indicated active interest in a possible combination with Wyandotte." But the letter says that "in no case have the discussions yet reached a stage which would warrant an announcement at this particular time."
SCIENCE:
Advisers to Governors Despite admonitions that chemists should stay out of politics, they continue to take the plunge into the "art of the possible." The latest to do so is Dr. Willard F. Libby of the University of California, Los Angeles. Gov. Don Samuelson of Idaho was expected to announce the appointment of Nobel Laureate Libby as his science adviser this week. The appointment marks the first time that a scientist of Nobel Prize stature moves into the ranks of state science advisers. But Dr. Libby joins company with another well-known chemist, ACS Past-President Robert W. Cairns, named last spring as science adviser to Gov. Russell W. Peterson of Delaware, also a chemist and
former director of the research and development division in Du Pont's research department. For the week preceding his appointment, Dr. Libby was in Sweden, conferring with a Nobel Prize committee. Gene P. Rutledge, executive director of the Idaho Nuclear Energy Commission, however, has indicated what Dr. Libby's first assignments will be. Much of this initial activity will call upon Dr. Libby's background as a nuclear chemist and former member of the Atomic Energy Commission. He will first try to chart a new course for the Materials Testing Reactor at Idaho's National Reactor Testing Station. MTR completes its engineering mission in April, 1970; however, Dr. Libby will seek to rename MTR as the Western Beam Research Reactor. Cutting across Idaho's boundaries, Dr. Libby will advise the 13-state Western Interstate Nuclear Compact and help develop a nuclear education and information center in Idaho Falls to serve the West. And he will look into the possibility of developing Idaho's 53,000-acre Craters of the Moon area into a field lab for the space program. Meanwhile, Dr. Cairns works on setting up an advisory structure to Gov. Peterson which would help promote the state's economic growth, particularly by location there of light industry, and grapple with such problems as "an intelligent approach to pesticide run-off," wetlands ecology, and the oyster fishing decline. Both Dr. Libby and Dr. Cairns will work with—as will 46 others similarly advising state governors—a still small, but Congressionally favored program at the National Science Foundation. That program supports innovative approaches to state and local governments' use of science and technology (C&EN, July 21, page 2 7 ) .
DESALINATION:
Two in Hollow Fibers
Willard Libby A plunge into the art of the possible
Two "firsts" have been logged by makers of hollow fibers for use in purifying water by reverse osmosis. Dow Chemical in its ground-breaking move is offering two varieties of its cellulose acetate fibers for commercial sale on a limited basis. The fiber types are alike in configuration but differ in their salt-rejecting characteristics and flux rates, says G. T. Westbrook, project manager for Dow's functional products and systems department. Meanwhile, Du Pont is readying the world's first reverse osmosis desalination plant for dedication and startup
