Lanxess to invest Rs 800 cr in Gujarat

Ahmedabad: Germany’s Lanxess ABS, which manufactures acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) polymer and styrene acrylonitrile (SAN) polymer in India, plans to invest Rs 800 crore to set up a greenfield chemical facility in Gujarat.

The company has acquired 40 acres of land near Jhagadia, to set up the ion exchange resin plant, which is to come up in the Gujarat Industrial Development Corporation (GIDC) estate.

Confirming the development, a senior government official said the company was looking at manufacturing NAOH and HCL gases among other chemicals.

Lanxess, which has interests in performance chemicals, chemical intermediates, engineering plastics and performance rubber, already has manufacturing facilities in Nandesari, Katol and Moxi in south and central Gujarat. Lanxess also has a research and development centre in Moxi.

The project may give a boost to Gujarat’s petrochemicals sector, which has witnessed memorandum of understandings to the tune of Rs 13,000 crore signed during the Vibrant Gujarat Global Investors’ summit held early in January 2007.

“We are already a dominating player in the sector. Chemical and petrochemicals, including petroleum, is the mainstay of industrial development in Gujarat, accounting for 60.3 per cent of the total industrial production. We are focusing on companies that are willing to invest in chemical and petrochemical projects. A bulk of exports in this sector goes to markets such as the US, Europe and other developed nations — a clear sign of the global competitiveness,” said a senior government official.

Government sources say the state is set to get over 770 large- and medium-scale units and about 310,000 small-scale units in the state with a fixed capital investment of $13.51 billion and $320 million respectively.