Len Blavatnik, Russian-born US owner of Basell (Hoofddorp / The Netherlands; www.basell.com), may have missed out on buying GE Plastics (GEP) – see Plasteurope.com Web of 22.05.2007 – but his private equity company Access Industries (New York) has landed another coup. A deal to acquire Huntsman (Salt Lake City, Utah / USA; www.huntsman.com) for USD 9.6 bn, including debt, has been agreed with the company's owners, the Huntsman family (57%) and investor MatlinPatterson. CEO Peter Huntsman told US journalists his company had been approached by other private equity buyers and had held negotiations with "several."

The transaction expected to close in the fourth quarter of this year is subject to approval by US and European regulatory authorities, whereby the net gain to the owners is estimated at USD 5.9 bn. The family's intake is to be placed in its charitable foundation. Blavatnik's mooted "plan B" after losing GEP to Sabic – a possible takeover of US chemical group Lyondell – evidently has been abandoned (see Plasteurope.com Web of 16.05.2007).

The merged Basell-Huntsman operation would have annual sales of around USD 26 bn (EUR 19.3 bn) generated by nearly 21,000 employees worldwide, and its portfolio would encompass a wide range of polyolefins and polyurethanes. Basell is Europe's leading polyolefins player, with a large licensing business. The match-up with Huntsman in polyurethane feedstock would put it into partnership (in China) with one of its former owners, BASF (Ludwigshafen / Germany – although BASF's polyurethanes business was never linked to Basell.

Earlier this year, Huntsman agreed to sell its US commodity chemicals business to Flint Hills Resources (www.fhr.com), a subsidiary of Koch Industries (Wichita, Kansas / USA; www.kochind.com) for USD 761m – see Plasteurope.com Web of 21.02.2007. This deal is expected to close shortly.