Linde plans to cut costs after Praxair merger failure

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Linde, the world's biggest industrial gases group by revenue, plans to cut costs and may and may close some sites abroad after failing to merge with US rival Praxair, German weekly Spiegel reported, as per Reuters.

The cuts will mainly affect the German company's plant-engineering unit, which serves the oil and gas sectors and has suffered from low oil prices, Spiegel said on Friday.

Linde has sites in over 100 countries and will also look at closing some of these, the magazine added.

Linde is working on how to present a vision of its future as a standalone company after the breakdown of talks with Praxair last month.

As MRC informed previously, in August 2016, Petronas Gas Bhd executed a shareholders agreement with Linde (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd for a joint-venture company to undertake the development of an air separation unit plant in Pengerang, Johor, a project that is estimated to cost USD172 million (RM692 million).

The Linde Group is a world-leading gases and engineering company with around 62,000 employees in more than 100 countries worldwide.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Deputy Minister of Petroleum and Managing Director of National Petrochemical Company (NPC) Marzieh Shahdaie says Iran's priority in petrochemical industry is use of gas as feedstock, reported Shana.

Shahdaie made the remarks on the sidelines of a ceremony where NPC and Japan's Sojitz signed a memorandum of understating for studies on construction of a methanol to propylene plant (MTP) in Iran.

Shahadie said, "One of the priorities of our petrochemical industry is using natural gas as feedstock. Alongside, the MTP project will be commissioned in cooperation with a Japanese company."

She said the NPC is to implement the MTP project using foreign investment. "Of course, the NPC Research and Technology Company has attained such a knowledge."

She said following improvement of Iran's relations with the international companies, Sojitz announced its readiness for investment in the MTP and GTPP projects and the MoU signed by the two parties will soon be implemented."

"Since there are abundant gas sources in Iran, implementation of the MTP project is big in its kind as it and its commissioning are one of the main policies of the Ministry of Petroleum."

If the project is economically and technically justified for foreign investor, including Sojitz, and addresses its needs, it will be implemented in Assalouyeh, she added.

Shahdaie said the NPC is in talks with German companies as well. "Many German companies seek cooperation with and investment in the Iranian petrochemical industry, hoping that once banking problems and barriers of the two sides are eliminated, the German companies' investment will increase."

We also remind that, as MRC informed previously, Royal Dutch Shell has signed a preliminary memorandum of understanding (MOU) with NPC for cooperation in the petrochemical industry. Hans Nijkamp, the head of the department for Iran affairs at Royal Dutch Shell, said the signing of the MOU came after months of negotiations between the two companies.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Royal Dutch Shell has signed a preliminary memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Iran’s National Petrochemical Co. (NPC) for cooperation in the petrochemical industry, the Iranian oil ministry’s news agency SHANA reported, said Reuters.

Hans Nijkamp, the head of the department for Iran affairs at Royal Dutch Shell, said the signing of the MOU came after months of negotiations between the two companies, according to SHANA.

"We believe that we can have joint projects in the petrochemical field with the National Petrochemical Company," he said.

Marzieh Shahdaei, Iran’s deputy oil minister and CEO of National Petrochemical Co., said that Iran plans to expand its petrochemical output from the current level of 60 MMtpy to 160 MMtpy by 2025, according to SHANA.

Amir-Hossein Zamaninia, a fellow Iranian deputy oil minister, expressed optimism that petrochemical projects between the two companies would be launched soon.

"With the wisdom that we see in the people working in our country’s petrochemical industry, without a doubt the projects of this company will be executed sooner than oil and gas projects," he said, according to SHANA.

As MRC informed previously, in March 2016, another world's pretrochemical major - Total Petrochemical - and NPC signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to build a petrochemical complex in Iran. Total sealed the cooperation agreement with NPC to build a petrochemical complex after signing a separate deal to buy 160,000 bpd of Iranian crude oil.

Royal Dutch Shell plc is an Anglo-Dutch multinational oil and gas company headquartered in The Hague, Netherlands and with its registered office in London, United Kingdom. It is the biggest company in the world in terms of revenue and one of the six oil and gas "supermajors". Shell is vertically integrated and is active in every area of the oil and gas industry, including exploration and production, refining, distribution and marketing, petrochemicals, power generation and trading.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Iran will inaugurate the first phase of its first polystyrene (PS) park in Assalouyeh, south of the country, within the next couple of months, as per Shana.

Ali Mohammad Bossaqzadeh, director of production control at National Petrochemical Company (NPC), told Shana that the park comprises 6 units of which two are Entekhab Arman and Takht Jamshid Units which are nearly complete.

He said the other units of the park will be complete within the next two years.

Bossaqzadeh said NPC aims at completing the value-chain in the petrochemical sector, adding completion of the value-chain minimizes production costs and can render variety to production of petrochemical items in the country.

He further said other units of the park including Sadaf Plant with 40% completion, Jam Petrochemical Plant with 30 to 35% progress and Dalahou with 60% progress.

Polystyrene is one of the most widely used plastics, the scale of its production being several billion kilograms per year. It can be naturally transparent, but can be colored with colorants. Uses include protective packaging (such as packing peanuts and CD and DVD cases), containers (such as "clamshells"), lids, bottles, trays, tumblers, and disposable cutlery.

As MRC wrote before, as of 2015, number of active Iranian Petrochemical complexes were 53, with total production capacity of 59 million metric ton, producing range of polymers, chemicals, aromatics & liquid gas, located mainly at Iranian south region, next to Persian Gulf, called Assaluyeh and Mahshahr Special Economic Zones.

At the moment, there are 67 developments projects in the country which are under construction, adding 61 million metric ton on total production and estimated to fully run till 2018.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Iran's National Petrochemical Company (NPC) has signed a memorandum of understating with Japan's Sojitz for carrying out studies over construction of a methanol to propylene plant in Iran, reported Shana.

Held at the locality of the NPC in Tehran, the signing ceremony of the MoU was attended by Managing Director of the NPC Marziyeh Shahdaei and Masaru Sato, Sojitz's senior representative on Saturday.

Speaking during the ceremony, Marziyeh Shahdaei, who is also deputy petroleum minister in petrochemical affairs, said the project is of crucial importance for Iran given the vast gas reserves it is sitting atop.

Sojitz has been active in Iran over 50 years and is the first foreign company active in Iran's petrochemical sector, said Sato during the meeting.

Sojitz Corporation is a general trading company based in Tokyo, Japan.

It is engaged in a wide range of businesses globally, including buying, selling, importing, and exporting goods, manufacturing and selling products, providing services, and planning and coordinating projects, in Japan and overseas.

Sojitz also invests in various sectors and conducts financing activities. The broad range of sectors in which Sojitz operates includes automobiles, energy, mineral resources, chemicals, foodstuff resources, agricultural and forestry resources, consumer goods, and industrial parks.

As MRC reported earlier, in July 2016, a fresh round of talks between NPC and Linde AG of Germany began over investment and participation in Iran’s most strategic petrochemical complex. Six month after the implementation of Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), no official agreement was signed with a foreign firm for development, investment attraction of reopening of credit and finance lines in the country’s petchem industries. Despite the inking of a contract with France’s Total for construction of a petrochemical plant in southern Iran, as well as numerous talks with Japan’s Mitsubishi and BASF of Germany to fund ongoing projects in Iran, neither negotiations nor MoUs have led to sealing of new contracts in the country’s petrochemical industry then.

Meanwhile, Iran’s petrochemical production capacity has reached about 62 million tons per year though National Petrochemical Company (NPC) officials have estimated that the figure will hit 100 million tons upon implementation of the Sixth National Development Plan.
MRC