BASF buys Clariant's superabsorbents

03 April 1998 11:44  [Source: ICIS news]

LONDON (CNI)--Germany's BASF is to take over the superabsorbent business of Swiss speciality chemicals group Clariant and plans to build a worldscale plant, it said Friday.

The deal, which requires approval by the antitrust authorities, includes Clariant's 95 000 tonne/year production at Portsmouth, Virginia, but not its 20 000 tonne/year German plant in Frankfurt. The Frankfurt plant is not large enough supply BASF's European customers in the long run, said BASF. Clariant's business had sales about SF350m in 1997, and employs around 240 people, mostly in the US. Financial details of the deal were not revealed.

Clariant will toll manufacture superabsorbents for BASF in Frankfurt for the next few years, and in the long term will probably switch manufacture to a different product, the Swiss company said.

BASF has a 20 000 tonne/year superabsorbents plant in Mannheim, Germany. It sees the Clariant acquisition as the first step towards developing a world market in superabsorbents, as well as providing a market for its acrylic acid, in which BASF is a world leader. A spokesman said the company hopes to achieve a turnover of around DM500m in superabsorbents "in a few years." Its business is currently under a distribution joint venture with Nippon Shokubai of Japan, which has a turnover of DM140m.

The Virginia plant will supply the US market, and in the future will also supply South America and Asia, BASF said. The world market in superabsorbents was growing at 8% per year, and faster in South America and Asia, the company added.

Superabsorbents are cross-linked polyacrylates, used in diapers (nappies) and other sanitary applications.

By: Anna Williams
+44 208 652 3214

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