Lubrizol has opened a new Global Capability Centre (GCC) in Pune, India, as “a strategic hub to accelerate its growth in the region and enable closer collaboration for its customers and employees”. It has also signed a Memorandum of Understanding to renew its strategic partnership with Proya Cosmetics in China.
Clariant has completed the previously announced acquisition of Lucas Meyer Cosmetics, a German-based maker of cosmetics and personal care ingredients, from IFF. The deal is based on an enterprise value of $810 million, subject to customary net debt and working capital adjustments.
Evonik is establishing a new business segment named Botanicals & Natural Actives within the Nutrition & Care division. This brings together various legacy products and recent acquisitions to meet demand for botanical extracts and natural actives. These include:
* Argentine firm Novachem, which offers natural and sustainable active ingredients for skin and hair care applications
* Swiss sustainable botanicals pioneer Botanica
* Alkion Biopharma, a specialist in biotechnologically developed cosmetic active ingredients
Symrise and India’s Virchow Group have agreed to make personal care ingredients from the Symrise portfolio through a new joint venture called Vizag Care Ingredients, beginning within 1H. This will be based on Virchow’s synthetic chemistry capabilities for API manufacture.
Symrise owns a majority in the new entity, which is based in Visakhapatnam and has one local chemical manufacturing site, enabling it to back-integrate into raw materials and form a resilient global value chain. Symrise will market the resulting products.
South Korean paint and chemicals firm KCC has agreed to acquire the minority stake of SJL Partners Momentive Performance Materials and assume full ownership. This is subject to customary closing conditions and no price has been disclosed. Based in New York state, Momentive is a major supplier of silicone and speciality products for applications including personal care.
During its 2023 results presentation, Evonik announced that it will establish a new organisational structure by the end of 2026. Under ‘Evonik Tailor Made’ it will eliminate administrative activities that do not directly support its businesses and bundle key tasks in the new structure.
Perstorp has officially inaugurated its ISCC Plus-certified Penta chemicals plant in at Sayakha in Gujarat state, India. Covering 115,000 m2 and employing 120, this will add 40,000 tonnes/year of pentaerythritol and 26,000 tonnes/year of calcium formate, while reducing lead times in Asia by about 50%. The product mix will include the renewable grade Voxtar, which is based on a traceable mass-balance concept and is chemically identical to Penta, which Perstorp already produces in Sweden, Germany and the US.
