MOSCOW (MRC) -- BASF, the world's largest petrochemical company, has broken ground for the third phase of its Innovation Campus Shanghai in a move to strengthen its innovation capabilities in Asia and established an academic sounding board as part of the Network for Asian Open Research (NAO), as per the company's press release.
The expansion includes an additional research and development (R&D) building and one R&D workshop building. Construction is expected to be completed by the end of 2022; by then, the total investment of BASF into its Innovation Campus Shanghai will sum up to around EUR280 million.
This further expansion demonstrates BASF’s continued commitment to further build up innovation capacities in China and the whole Asia Pacific region.
With this expansion, BASF will strengthen its R&D capabilities for advanced materials and systems as well as for chemical engineering in order to serve the needs of growing industries, such as automotive, construction, and coatings.
Accompanying this expansion at the Innovation Campus Shanghai, BASF is establishing a sounding board made up of experts from top universities in Asia as part of the Network for Asian Open Research (NAO). The sounding board will strengthen BASF’s innovation pipelines and accelerate market introduction by providing professional consultancy for R&D projects, anticipating industry trends, and enhancing the collaborations between BASF and universities.
Launched in 2014, NAO is a joint platform of BASF and meanwhile 12 prestigious universities and institutes in Asia Pacific. To date, more than 70 joint projects have been completed, covering a wide range of research areas including monomers, polymers, surfaces and interfaces, coatings, catalysis, battery materials, chemical and process engineering, insecticides, as well as digitalization and smart manufacturing in R&D.
The Innovation Campus Shanghai has become an innovation powerhouse for BASF and its partners. Over the past five years, the Innovation Campus Shanghai has applied for more than 220 patents. The site plays an increasing role in the development of innovations for the automotive, construction and consumer goods industries.
As MRC reported earlier, in April 2021, Trinseo, a global materials company and manufacturer of plastics, latex binders and synthetic rubber, and BASF announced the intention to expand their businesses with the production of styrene monomer (SM) based on circular feedstock. The enhanced collaboration between Trinseo and BASF aims to increase efforts by both companies in the development and management of SM featuring an improved environmental profile.
BASF is the leading chemical company. It produces a wide range of chemicals, for example solvents, amines, resins, glues, electronic-grade chemicals, industrial gases, basic petrochemicals and inorganic chemicals. The most important customers for this segment are the pharmaceutical, construction, textile and automotive industries.
MRC