The reorganisation and expansion of the engineering plastics business at BASF (Ludwigshafen / Germany; www.basf.com) is moving forward steadily. On 30 December, the group acquired customer lists for PA 6, PA 6.6, PBT and POM from Lati USA, North American affiliate of Italian plastics producer Lati Industria Termoplastici (Vedano Olona; www.lati.com), but no production facilities or employees. BASF said sales of the businesses are in the “low double-digit million dollar range.” The US buy is its fourth in engineering plastics over the past three years. Other deals involved PA businesses of Leuna-Miramid, Honeywell and Ticona.

Another of the German chemical giant´s recent moves – unveiled at the recent Fakuma packaging exhibition – was to create “PlasticsPlus”, bringing together styrenic specialities and other products into the newly founded Specialty Polymers & Specialty Foams business unit. According to business unit head Michael Stumpp, this platform will emphasise innovative specialities.

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Special issue of BASF´s customer magazine “Plastics” on PlasticsPlus as PDF document (3,322 KB)