Sadara Chemical Company achieves key milestone of first polyethylene production

The Dow Chemical Company announced that its joint venture in the Middle East – Sadara Chemical Company (Sadara) – has achieved a key milestone of first polyethylene production, meeting previously announced targets to begin production by year-end 2015. This landmark investment has been a key pillar of Dow’s targeted, strategic growth actions over the last several years, and supports the Company’s strategy to enable cost-advantaged growth in fast-growing regions such as Asia Pacific, the Middle East, Africa, India, and Eastern and Central Europe. Sadara is a joint venture developed by Dow and Saudi Arabian Oil Company (Saudi Aramco) “Sadara is a significant chapter in Dow’s consistent and deliberate drive towards targeted, high-margin markets, and today’s milestone is the latest milestone in a new era of transformative growth,” said Andrew N. Liveris, Dow’s chairman and chief executive officer. “The Sadara joint venture is an extraordinary collaboration that builds upon the unique strengths of its parent companies to deliver a performance-focused portfolio to drive this global growth, and this investment is further demonstration of Dow’s commitment to deliver consistent, long-term earnings growth and reward our shareholders.” Sadara’s 26 manufacturing assets remain on schedule for a sequenced start-up process, beginning with the polyolefins envelope to maximize timing in the ethylene cycle, followed by ethylene oxide/propylene oxide and their derivatives. With commitments from global customers for the full output of the polyethylene units, excitement continues to increase as Dow businesses actively engage in pre-marketing activities and prepare to sell the majority of products produced by Sadara Chemical Company via agreements with the joint venture, to support growth throughout the emerging world in key markets such as packaging, construction, electronics, furniture and bedding, automotive and transportation. "This milestone represents a new era of growth, as Dow will be able to deliver a technology-rich product portfolio to emerging markets with greater speed. Our customer base is eager for this new volume, and we are pleased to be able to support our customer’s growth in geographies that will benefit from Sadara’s close proximity,” said Diego Donoso, business president, Dow Packaging and Specialty Plastics. The performance-focused product portfolio will add new value chains to the Kingdom’s vast petroleum reserves, resulting in the diversification of the economy and region