MOSCOW (MRC) -- Lotte Chemical has taken over a Vietnamese high-tech material company to attain its vision of becoming the seventh-largest chemical industry in the world, said Businesskorea.
The company is diversifying its overseas business portfolio, ranging from basic materials to high-tech materials.
Lotte Chemical acquired Vina Polytech in April. Vina Polytech produces materials for home appliances and mobile products. Lotte Chemical has invested billions of won to acquire it.
Shortly after the acquisition of Vina Polytech, Lotte Chemical set up a local corporation in Indonesia under the name of PT Lotte Chemical Engineering Plastic Indonesia. It established the company to build a compounding product plant that produces high-tech materials for automobiles. Lotte Chemical has expanded its business in Southeast Asia, which has been focused on basic materials, to include high-tech materials.
Southeast Asia is one of Lotte Chemical's key markets. Major Southeast Asian countries including Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam are home to production facilities of large companies from around the world. This explains why Lotte Chemical has established a base in Southeast Asia.
In 2010, Lotte Chemical knocked on the door to the Southeast Asian market by acquiring Malaysia's state-run petrochemical company Titan (currently Lotte Chemical Titan). Lotte Chemical is planning to create a large petrochemical complex in Indonesia by investing five trillion won. Tthe petrochemical complex, when completed, will produce one million tons of ethylene annually.
Lotte Chemical aims to become the world's seventh-largest chemical company with sales of 50 trillion won by 2030. For this, it has been expanding investment in the basic materials business, sharpening competitiveness and promoting growth in the high-tech material business. Lotte Chemical's sales in 2019 amounted to 15.12 trillion won. It needs to more than triple its sales over a decade to attain the goal.
We remind that, as MRC informed before, Lotte Chemical Titan Holding (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia), an affiliate of Lotte Chemical (Seoul, South Korea), announced that the group's ethane cracker and ethylene glycol (EG) plant at Lake Charles, Louisiana, commenced commercial operations in August, 2019. Lotte Chemical USA, a 40/60 joint venture (JV) between Lotte Chemical Titan and Lotte Chemical, holds the Lotte group's stakes in the plants. The USD3.1-billion ethane cracker is an 88/12 JV between Lotte Chemical USA and Axiall, a subsidiary of Westlake Chemical. Lotte has invested about USD1.9 billion in the JV. Lotte Chemical USA owns 100% of the EG plant.
According to MRC's DataScope report, PE imports to Russia dropped in January-June 2020 by 7% year on year to 328,000 tonnes. High density polyethylene (HDPE) accounted for the main decrease in imports. At the same time, PP imports into Russia rose in the first six months of 2020 by 21% year on year to 105,300 tonnes. Propylene homopolymer (homopolymer PP) accounted for the main increase in imports.
MRC