BP Deal With Solvay Strengthens Polyolefins Position

20-Dec-2000

BP and Solvay announced today that they have signed a memorandum of understanding aimed at strengthening their polymers businesses in Europe and the United States. In Europe, Solvay will transfer its polypropylene business to BP. The two companies will also combine their European high-density polyethylene (HDPE) businesses into a 50-50 joint venture. In the US, the agreement will lead to Solvay and BP creating a 51-49 joint venture for Solvay’s current HDPE business and Solvay transferring its polypropylene business to BP. In addition, BP will transfer its engineering polymers business to Solvay. The transaction involves businesses with a combined turnover of $2.62 billion. “This agreement is an important step in our chemicals/order_t/'>petrochemicals portfolio repositioning,” said Byron Grote, chief executive of BP’s chemicals business. “It creates an industry-leading joint venture in HDPE in Europe, allows BERTHA to enter the US HDPE business as an integrated producer of ethylenegives BP an equity position in the US HDPE market to support the growth of our olefins business, and accesses significant efficiencies from merging Solvay's polypropylene assets into our own. Our disposal of the engineering polymers business is consistent with our focusing the BP portfolio into a limited set of distinctive global positions.” The proposed transaction will be subject to the final agreement of both parties and to regulatory approval by the relevant authorities, as well as consultation with workers’ representatives. Completion is anticipated in mid-2001. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed. The agreement strengthens BP’s polypropylene position in the US and Europe. With the addition of Solvay’s 800,000 tonnes of annual production, BP will manage the world’s second largest portfolio of polypropylene assets — some 3.1 million tonnes of annual production. The US and European joint ventures in HDPE will give BP and Solvay positions in about 2.2 million tonnes of annual production. Solvay will also take a leading global position in the high-growth high performance engineering polymers business.

https://www.chemeurope.com/en/news/549/bp-deal-with-solvay-strengthens-polyolefins-position.html