NEWS
IN BRIEF
Hydrogen burner online
Lanxess has brought online the hydrogen burner it installed at its Krefeld-Uerdingen site in Germany at the end of 2025, to power a spray dryer for iron oxide pigments. It will replace natural gas, reducing the company’ s carbon footprint by about 6,000 tonnes / year. The hydrogen is produced during chlorine electrolysis at the neighbouring Covestro plant and piped directly to Lanxess.
AmbioPharm deal completes
CordenPharma has completed the acquisition of peptide CDMO AmbioPharm. The acquired facilities will be renamed CordenPharma South Carolina and CordenPharma Shanghai and integrated into the manufacturing network over the coming months. The company stated that this“ reinforces our peptides platform and enhances our global manufacturing network”.
Ineos buys Runcorn MCP
Subject to legal and regulatory processes, Ineos Inovyn has agreed to acquire the remaining 50 % stake it does not already own in Runcorn MCP from Vynova Runcorn, which is in administration. Ineos said that this will fully integrate the chloralkali and ethylene dichloride value chain at the site and strengthen“ the UK ' s chlor-alkali backbone”.
RNA collaboration
Wacker Chemies’ Wacker Biotech subsidiary has formed a strategic collaboration with San Diego-based biotech Eclipsebio. This unites Eclipsebio’ s integrated platform of AI-optimised RNA design and sequencing-based validation with Wacker Biotech’ s large-scale, GMPcompliant manufacturing of nucleic acid-based therapies. No terms were disclosed.
Vink Chemicals and its partner Pyropower have held the topping-out ceremony for the biochar plant from regional sources at its new site in Schwerin, Germany. This will produce biochar as its main product, with electricity and heat as by-products to supply Vink’ s production facilities and others at Göhrener Tannen Industrial Park.
FFEM opens cleaners facility
Fujifilm Electronic Materials( FFEM) has begun production at a new building at its site in Oita, Japan. The company said that this will triple capacity for post-CMP cleaners for the manufacture of advanced semiconductors, including those for AI applications. These are used after CMP processes to remove particles, trace metals and organic residues while protecting metal surfaces.
Between the 2021 and 2024 fiscal years, FFEM saw average growth of about 20 %/ year and it has invested over ¥ 100 billion to address this, including for CMP slurries,
5-HMF JV in France
polyimides and photosensitive dielectric materials for advanced packaging. Further expansions are envisaged as demand continues to grow, driven in part by advances in semiconductor miniaturisation and 3D stacking technologies.
Michelin ResiCare, an adhesives producing subsidiary of the tyres giant, has entered into exclusive discussions with its French compatriot Axens for the joint commercialisation of production technology for 5-hydroxymethylfurfural( 5-HMF). 5-HMF is a precursor for solvents, resins and polymers, including polyethylene furanoate( PEF), a biobased plastic that can replace polyethylene terephthalate( PET).
The partners expect to commission a first 3,000 tonnes / year facility at Péage-de-Roussillon, southern France, in early 2027. Axens will contribute its licensing and engineering expertise to deploy the technology globally and substitute fossil-based products with renewable alternatives.
The process was developed by Michelin ResiCare and IFP Energies Nouvelles. Financial support came from ADEME, France’ s Agency for Ecological Transition, and Circular Bio-based Europe Joint Undertaking, a public-private partnership between the EU and the biobased industries sector.
14 SPECIALITY CHEMICALS MAGAZINE ESTABLISHED 1981