Brussels, September 4, 2014 --- Solvay has signed an agreement to buy the Ryton® PPS (polyphenylene sulphide) business from U.S.-based petrochemical company Chevron Phillips Chemical Company for $220 million, expanding its offering of high-performance polymers and entering a solid growth market.
Solvay Specialty Polymers, which has the industry's broadest product portfolio, will gain access to new business segments and customers and broaden its offer in many innovative and demanding applications. Ryton® PPS has a strong share in the automotive sector, replacing metal parts to make cars lighter and more energy efficient. Other worldwide leading positions are in electronics where it enhances fire resistance of components, and in filter bags to extend their lifetime in reducing pollution at coal-fired power stations.
"Ryton® PPS fits neatly with our unique specialty polymers portfolio and reinforces our unrivalled capabilities to provide solutions to our customers in dynamic innovative end-markets," said Augusto Di Donfrancesco, President of Solvay Specialty Polymers.
The Group will buy from Chevron Phillips Chemical two Ryton® PPS resin manufacturing units in Borger, Texas, its pilot plant along with R&D laboratories in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, and a compounding plant in Kallo-Beveren, Belgium. Chevron Philips Chemical's compounding unit in La Porte, Texas, will provide temporary tolling services to Solvay.
Synergies in purchasing, commercial and manufacturing excellence initiatives will further bolster performance. Chevron Phillips Chemical recently developed a highly innovative PPS production technology, which has not yet achieved its full potential. Solvay will invest and use its engineering know-how and operational excellence process to raise this new technology capacity over the next three years, leveraging the talent and quality of the 200 Ryton® PPS employees who will join the Group.
This acquisition is part of Solvay's strategic development into a more specialized solutions provider, delivering higher growth, and greater returns while reducing cyclicality. Completion of the transaction is due in the fourth quarter of 2014 and subject to customary closing conditions.
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| As an international chemical group, SOLVAY assists industries in finding and implementing ever more responsible and value-creating solutions. Solvay generates 90% of its net sales in activities where it is among the world's top three players. It serves many markets, varying from energy and the environment to automotive and aeronautics or electricity and electronics, with one goal: to raise the performance of its clients and improve society's quality of life. The group is headquartered in Brussels, employs about 29,400 people in 56 countries and generated 9.9 billion euros in net sales in 2013. Solvay SA (SOLB.BE) is listed on NYSE Euronext in Brussels and Paris (Bloomberg: SOLB:BB - Reuters: SOLB.BR). |
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