China clears Merck acquisition of Versum

MOSCOW (MRC) -- -Versum Materials, Inc. (NYSE: VSM), a leading materials supplier to the semiconductor industry, today announced that the State Administration for Market Regulation of the People’s Republic of China (SAMR) provided unconditional antitrust clearance for the proposed acquisition of Versum by Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany, said the company.

Subject to the satisfaction of other customary closing conditions, Versum expects the merger to close on October 7, 2019.

Upon completion of the merger, Versum’s stockholders will have the right to receive USD53.00 per share in cash, without interest and less any applicable withholding tax, for each share of common stock that they own immediately prior to the completion of the merger.

Versum, which was spun off from Air Products in 2016, is described as one of the world's leading suppliers of high-purity process chemicals, gases and equipment for semiconductor manufacturing.

It had sales of about USD1.4bn last year and employs 2,300 people across 15 manufacturing and seven R&D facilities in North America and Asia.

As MRC informed earlier, Versum Materials Inc. rejected a USD5.9 billion takeover offer from Merck KGaA, and said it’s committed to completing the previously announced merger with Entegris Inc.

Versum Materials, Inc. VSM, +0.03% is one of the world’s leading suppliers of next-generation CMP slurries, ultra-thin dielectric and metal film precursors, formulated cleans and etching products, and delivery equipment that has revolutionized the semiconductor industry. Versum Materials has annual sales of approximately US $1.4 billion, 2,300 employees and operates 14 major facilities in Asia and North America. It is headquartered in Tempe, Arizona. Prior to its separation on Oct. 1, 2016, Versum Materials had operated for more than three decades as a division of Air Products and Chemicals, Inc.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- German clean-tech company Sunfire and French oil major Total said they will team up on a pilot project to produce methanol from renewables and carbon dioxide at the Leuna refinery in Germany, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

Refineries are counting on hydrogen technologies to make good on pledges to cut harmful emissions by turning carbon and renewable power into novel fuels to replace oil and gas.

Sunfire and Total - a major shareholder in the Leuna refinery - said a plant would be completed at the refinery next year and production was expected to start in 2021, generating 500 tonnes of green methanol in the first three years.

Dresden-based Sunfire will provide and operate a 1-megawatt electrolyzer that could later be integrated in the production of industrial-scale amounts of green methanol and hydrogen from CO2 generated in the refinery processes. “Total is delighted to develop efficient technologies to re-use CO2 to chemicals, materials and fuels,” Total’s Group Chief Technology Officer Marie-Noelle Semeria said in a statement announcing the project.

“Carbon capture, utilization and storage is going to play an essential role in achieving carbon neutrality without curbing economic and social growth,” she added. Total’s venture capital arm is a minority shareholder in Sunfire.

The electrolyzer will allow steam or waste heat from the refinery’s operations to be used and complement and reduce the use of green electricity, the companies said. Leuna is located in northern Germany which often produces excess wind power as a result of a subsidized turbine building program over the past 20 years that has driven experiments with hydrogen plants.

By splitting power into oxygen and hydrogen, water-based electrolysis can produce fuels that are easy to store and transport. “This (electrolysis) technology can become the core building block for energy sectors that cannot source electricity directly from renewables,” said Nils Aldag, managing director of Sunfire.

“With the transformation into renewable gases and fuels and the use of existing infrastructures, we can make the transport sector and the chemical industry climate-neutral.”

As it was written earlier, Total has power loss at US Port Arthur refinery. A power loss at the refinery resulted in emissions and flaring from several units, according to a filing with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ).

Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polyprolypele (PP).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 1,255,800 tonnes in the first seven months of 2019, up by 9% year on year. Shipments of all PE grades increased. At the same time, the estimated PP consumption in the Russian market was 796,120 tonnes in January-July 2019, up by 11% year on year. Shipments of PP block copolymer and homopolymer PP increased.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Toray Industries, Inc., announced that Toray Industries (India) Private Limited began manufacturing polyamide (PA) and polybutylene terephthalate (PBT) at a new facility in September, said the company.

These resins offer outstanding toughness and resistance to heat and chemicals. Key applications include components for automotive and electrical and electronic. This first Indian plastic compounding unit of a Japanese manufacturer should reach its full operating capacity of around 5,000 metric tons in the near future.

The Indian economy is set to expand at around 6% annually from 2019 through 2030. Demand should grow for engineering plastics as rising incomes drive demand for luxury and high-value-added goods, among them automobiles and appliances. Toray set up the new facility to swiftly capitalize on this potential and build its business in India by stabilizing supplies and cutting lead times, optimizing inventories and delivery, and bolstering local development.

Toray also looks to produce polyphenylene sulfide (PPS) at the Indian facility and set up a technical center there to serve a rising local need for high-performance products and materials. Identifying Indian requirements in product development will equip Toray to cater more responsively to increasingly complex customer requirements amid tightening environmental regulations.

One basic strategy of Project AP-G 2019, Toray's medium-term management program, is to expand and advance its global business. The company accordingly plans to position the Sri City plant of Toray Industries (India) as a base for serving the Indian, Southeast Asian, and other markets around the world.

As MRC informed earlier, BASF and Toray Advanced Composites have inked a manufacturing and supply agreement for the supply of continuous fibre reinforced thermoplastic (CFRT) tapes. Under the terms, Toray will make CFRT tapes using BASF's Ultramid engineering thermoplastics.

Butadiene is one of the main raw materials for the production of acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS).

According to the ICIS-MRC Price Report, because of low prices in Asia in August, ABS imports to Russia amounted to 3.600 tonnes compared to 2,800 tonnes a month earlier and 2,700 tonnes in August last year. According to the results of January - August, the import of ABS in the Russian Federation did not change relative to the same period last year and amounted to 21,900 tonnes.

MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Saudi Aramco will supply agreed grades and volumes to India’s Reliance Industries in October after the world’s top oil exporter had to provide alternate heavier grader due to drone attacks on its oil installations, reported Hellenic Shipping News with reference to a spokesperson at the Indian company.

The Sept. 14 drone and missile attacks on two giant facilities that process mainly light crude knocked down about 5.7 million barrels per day, more than half of the production of the world’s top oil exporter, forcing the Kingdom to supply heavier grade instead of light oil to some refiners.

"Aramco (has) confirmed and reassured that supplies for October will be maintained both in terms of quantity and mix of grades as per our requirement," said the spokesperson.

Aramco has been a major and reliable supplier of crude oil for Reliance for more than twenty years, both in terms of volume of crude supply as well as the mix of various grades of crude oil, the spokesperson added.

"In the immediate aftermath of the incident, Aramco maintained supply with alternate grades of crude oil. The alternate grades being heavier suited Reliance’s refining needs," the spokesperson said.

Reliance, owners of the world’s biggest refining complex at Jamnagar in western Gujarat state, is a major buyer of Saudi oil and recently announced plans to sell a fifth of its petrochemical and refining business to Aramco in a multibillion dollar deal.

As MRC reported before, a number of Saudi Arabia's companies, such as Tasnee, Sadara, Advanced Petrochemical and Saudi Kayan, announced a curtailment of feedstock to their petrochemical plants, including polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) facilities, by an average of 30-50% due to the attacks on key Saudi Aramco facilities on Saturday.

Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polyprolypele (PP).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 1,255,800 tonnes in the first seven months of 2019, up by 9% year on year. Shipments of all PE grades increased. At the same time, the estimated PP consumption in the Russian market was 796,120 tonnes in January-July 2019, up by 11% year on year. Shipments of PP block copolymer and homopolymer PP increased.

Saudi Aramco is an integrated oil and chemicals company, a global leader in hydrocarbon production, refining processes and distribution, as well as one of the largest global oil exporters. It manages proven reserves of crude oil and condensate estimated at 261.1bn barrels, and produces 9.54 million bbl daily. Headquartered in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, the company employs over 61,000 staff in 77 countries.

Reliance Industries is one of the world's largest producers of polymers. Thus, the company produces among others polypropylene, polyethylene and polyvinyl chloride.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Saudi Arabia has restored its oil production to more than 9.9 million b/d and the country has started replenishing some of the crude stocks that were tapped in the immediate wake of the attacks on its key oil facilities, reported S&P Global with reference to the head of Aramco's trading division.

"Our system was able to grow and become healthier as we moved along and by September 25, we were able to restore all the capacity we had before the attack," the president and CEO of Aramco Trading Co., Ibrahim al-Buainain, told an industry banquet in Fujairah.

"On the 25th we reached the (9.9 million b/d) target, actually. Most of you are aware we have spare capacity. So we are actually a little higher than this," he said.

With production fully restored, Aramo was able to start replenishing some of the inventories that it used in the four or five days immediately after the attack, he said.

Armed drones and missiles attacked Saudi Aramco's largest crude-processing facility at Abqaiq and its key Khurais oil field on September 14 in a strike which initially took some 5.7 million b/d of production offline.

Buainain said "not one single shipment" to any of Aramco's customers were missed or canceled as a result of the attack, proving how resilient Saudi oil infrastructure is.

"Our system was able to grow and become more healthier as we moved along ... it made us more stronger," he said. "The rapid response and recovery of production serves to demonstrate that Saudi Aramco is far more resilient than anyone could have imagined."

As MRC reported earlier, a number of Saudi Arabia's companies, such as Tasnee, Sadara, Advanced Petrochemical and Saudi Kayan, announced a curtailment of feedstock to their petrochemical plants, including polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) facilities, by an average of 30-50% due to the attacks on key Saudi Aramco facilities on Saturday.

Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polyprolypele (PP).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 1,255,800 tonnes in the first seven months of 2019, up by 9% year on year. Shipments of all PE grades increased. Meanwhile, the estimated PP consumption in the Russian market was 796,120 tonnes in January-July 2019, up by 11% year on year. Shipments of PP block copolymer and homopolymer PP increased.
MRC