Skip to main content

SPONSORED CONTENT: Optima Chemical

21st August 2019

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

At Optima Chemical, typically our first words to you are ‘Welcome, how can we help you’. If there is one thing that epitomises Optima, it is a commitment to truly serve our customers and it runs deep, through every level of the organisation. We believe it is the key to our growth from the company that offered a single product almost 30 years ago to what we are today, a full-service chemical company with the infrastructure to take ideas through to delivered products and solutions.

Optima today has an engineering skill-set that enables us to manufacture high-energy and high-hazard, sensitive chemistry safely at scale at two US-based manufacturing plants, where we manufacture for our contract partners as well as own products. Our laboratories are run by a team that offers technical support to our contract manufacturing partners as well as analytical development, route development and scale-up for other customers, be it for custom-made products or some short-term use of our facilities. Underpinning all of this is a culture of safety, service and flexibility.

The single product that we first offered 30 years ago was sodium tetraphenyl borate; we handled magnesium and made our own Grignards. We still do this today, but the business has evolved and grown. We handle many metals now, make many organometallics and have our own product lines that stem from this technology platform.

One of our key products is used as an intermediate for a recently launched new drug and in 2018 Optima rose to the challenge of a twelve-fold increase in its manufacturing throughput. We delivered this within a year, under the pressure of actual production for the customer.

On the contract manufacturing side, 2019 has seen us rise to the challenge of helping a new blue-chip customer to launch their latest innovative technology to the consumer market. Working closely with our customer, we took the project from process development through to commercial production within ten months. Significant investment from Optima enabled this to happen. The expectation is for further growth over the next few years.

The significant organic growth we have experienced over the last few years has been fueled by investment in our plant at Douglas, Georgia (pictured), and the acquisition of additional plant at Belle, West Virginia, from DuPont at the end of 2015. Our overall reactor capacity now stands at approximately 100,000 gallons (380 m3). In parallel to the plant investment projects, we designed and built a new headquarters in 2019. Based at the Douglas site, the new building is two-storey, 16,000 ft2 (1,486 m2) and designed to be a collaborative space that is an efficient working environment for teams. It goes without saying that we delivered this project in less than 12 months too.

CONTACT

US
Doug Cochran
VP Business Development
Optima Chemicals Group
+1 980 219 1333
dcochran@optimachem
www.optimachem.com

EUROPE
Mike Harrison
Product Development
Optima Chemicals Group
+44 7570 985995
[email protected]
www.optimachem.com

Helm, CAC Nantong expand partnership

Helm has reached an agreement with CAC Nantong Chemical to expand their global partnership. Under

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

UPL to split out specialities

Indian agrochemicals giant UPL has announced plans to transfer its speciality chemicals business, including agrochemical

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

AI for SAPs

Together with Algo Artis, Japan’s Nippon Shokubai has developed an algorithm-based means for the production

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

Sterling suite

CDMOs grow in ADCs

Reflecting the ongoing boom in the development antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs), two Western CDMOs announced expansions

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

Flamma Lundbeck

Flamma buys Lundbeck site

Italian CDMO Flamma has entered into an agreement to acquire Lundbeck Pharmaceuticals Italy (LuPI) from

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

Opening ceremony at UPM's biorefinery in Leuna

UPM opens biorefinery in Germany

UPM has inaugurated a biorefinery in Leuna, Germany, which will make up to 220,000 tonnes/year

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

Solenis pulp centre in Brazil

Solenis moves pulp centre

Solenis has relocated its Pulp Centre of Excellence from the US to a new facility

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

Milestones for two greentech firms

Afyren has achieved continuous production at its Afyren Neoxy plant at Clermont-Ferrand (pictured)

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

CABB in algae biorefinery deal

CABB has agreed a strategic partnership to establish a first-in-kind algae biorefinery at its site at Kokkola

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

First waste-based biosurfactants

Belgian start-up AmphiStar has launched what it claims are the first fully upcycled biobased surfactants

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

Symrise facility in India

Symrise in double Asian expansion

Symrise has announced that it has opened its new Scent Creative Centre in Singapore and

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

Lubrizol opens London office

Lubrizol has opened a new office in Hammersmith, London. This will be home to a

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

Sudarshan to buy Heubach

India’s Sudarshan Chemical Industries (SCIL) has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire the Heubach

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

Lanxess to continue pigment production

Lanxess has reversed a decision to sell the chromium oxide pigments business at the Krefeld-Uerdingen

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

Alliance in natural fragrances

Sensegen, a US-based specialist in biotech-enabled fragrances, notably a new class of natural musk raw

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

Croda breaks ground in China

Croda International has broken ground for a low-carbon, multi-purpose production facility on a greenfield site

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

Semiconductor manufacturing

Sumitomo Chemical works with Tata

Sumitomo Chemical has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with India’s Tata Electronics to explore a

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington

FramoChem and VanDeMark are separated

VanDeMark separation is complete

Japan’s Hodogaya Chemical has completed the previously announced acquisition of Hungarian API and intermediates producer

Submitted by:

Andrew Warmington