Indorama directors approve acquisition plan for Eastman's PET business in UK and Netherlands

12-Dec-07

Directors at Indorama Holdings (Thailand) have approved acquisition of Eastman Chemical’s PET business in the UK and the Netherlands. The Thai company is willing to shell out a maximum price of EURO 65 mln for the take-over which will add a total of 340,000 tpa of PET capacity to the group’s portfolio. With this acquisition, Indorama moves a step closer to becoming one of the world’s top three PET suppliers. The deal will extend Indorama’s existing European business, currently based on a greenfield operation in Lithuania, which opened last year. Indorama acquired plants in Thailand in 1998 and StarPet, in the US, in 2003. The PET major will have 1.4 mln tpa of capacity on completion of a US expansion and the Eastman deal. Eastman has been successively selling its PET businesses outside the US with the goal of focusing on world scale units where it can leverage its IntegRex technology. Factors governing Indorama’s decision include PET demand growth, excess of demand over supply in Europe, the low investment cost in comparison with a greenfield investment and access to a larger customer base.