Plastic sheet, film and cellulose manufacturer Hagedorn AG (D-49012 Osnabrück; www.hagedorn.de) has settled out of court with Hoechst AG (D-65926 Frankfurt) in a long-running suit over Irish PET sheet producer Hostaglas Ltd. Despite the EUR 2.6m court award, the Osnabrück company continues to assert that it was deceived by Hoechst about the patent rights of the Irish sheet producer it acquired from the former chemical group in 1998. Hostaglas is currently in liquidation and will be dissolved by the end of 2003.

Hagedorn plans to use the court award to increase its share capital by around 40%, whereby it will finance about 60% of the increase from existing funds. The company has seen hard times financially, in particular due to the long-running dispute with Hoechst. However, chairman Dirk Brauch told Plasteurope.com that business has improved during 2003 and the company expects a positive operating profit and net result for the full year.