Merck KGaA has broken ground for a new production facility on a 150,000 m² site for its Semiconductor Solutions business at Kaohsiung, Taiwan. It will produce speciality gases and semiconductor materials for thin film and patterning from 2025 onwards.

Semiconductor Solutions has been designated as one Merck’s ‘Big 3’ growth drivers. It forms part of the Electronics business sector, which started its ‘Level Up’ growth programme in 2021 with the aim of investing “significantly more than €3 billion” in innovations and capacity expansion projects by 2025.

Merck KGaA has closed its previously announced details to acquire M Chemicals, the company recently incorporated by Mecaro to operate its chemical business. This will bring it around 100 new employees as well as advanced production and R&D facilities in Korea.

The company said that the newly acquired operation is “expected to complement a key segment of Merck’s Semiconductor Solutions portfolio”. This in turn is one of the ‘Big 3’ growth engines recently identified as driving Merck’s ‘Level Up, growth programme.

Merck KGaA has revealed at its latest Capital Markets Day that it will continue to focus on its ‘Big Three’ businesses of Process Solutions and Life Science Services, new products in Healthcare and the Semiconductor Solutions arm.

By 2025, these are expected to generate about 80% of targeted sales growth, and more than 50% of total sales. The company remains on track to achieve its mid-term growth target of €25 billion that year and expects to increase sales organically by at least 6%/year on average, about €1 billion/year.

Merck KGaA’s Life Science business sector has launched ChetoSensar, a technology that improves the solubility of antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs). Over 20% of ADC candidates are terminated in clinical trials because of poor solubility. The company said that this supports it efforts to double its ADC and HPAPI capacity in the near future.

Merck KGaA is to spend €20 million to expand the R&D and manufacturing capabilities at its site in Shizuoka, Japan, where it opened a 6,000 m² facility in January. Due to be complete by January 2022, this will mainly address demand in areas driven by the digital economy boom.

Alongside its Q3 results, Merck KGaA presented its new sustainability strategy, which it said integrates sustainability “more strongly as an essential component of its corporate strategy”. The bonus pay of board members will be linked to progress in the three specific goals, which are:

1. “In 2030, Merck will achieve human progress for more than one billion people through sustainable science and technology”, with focus areas of sustainable innovations and technologies for customers, and the impact of its technologies and products on health and well-being

Merck KGaA, has announced a €20 million expansion of its OLED manufacturing capacity at sites in Pyeongtaek, Korea, and Shanghai, China. This comes in response to growing demand, the company said.

The investment will be spent on building a new modular production system to facilitate the installation of additional sublimation units. These units are central to material purity, which is one of the most important factors in the performance and lifetime of OLED devices.