Business Roundup

Mexichem says the U.S. International Trade Commission has voted to impose antidumping duties ranging from 148 to 167% on Chinese imports of R-134a, a hydrofluorocarbon that Mexichem makes in Louisiana for auto air conditioners. The vote followed a year-long investigation.

ExxonMobil Chemical is expanding capacity for hydrocarbon fluids by a total of 250,000 metric tons per year at its plants in Baytown, Texas; Antwerp, Belgium; and Singapore by early 2019. The solvents are used in applications such as mining, metal working, polymer processing, water treatment, adhesives, and coatings.

Celanese has sued three Chinese manufacturers of the artificial sweetener acesulfame potassium for patent infringement in Europe. Celanese claims the companies are violating its newly granted European patent No. 2861569.

OG&A BioSpecialties, a venture of Owensboro Grain and Accelergy, is building a plant in Owensboro, Ky., that will convert soy and other biobased feedstocks into waxes and esters for heat transfer fluids, lubricants, and oil-field use. The plant is set to open in 2018.

Twist Bioscience has raised an additional $33 million, bringing its total funding to $166 million. The four-year-old firm recently added a location in South San Francisco to expand its production of synthetic DNA.

C4 Therapeutics and Calico Life Sciences have entered a five-year collaboration to discover and develop therapies for age-related diseases. C4T uses small molecules to direct the ubiquitin-proteasome system to selectively degrade disease-relevant proteins.

The University of Dundee has secured about $1.2 million in U.K. government funding to develop antibiotics. The university will use the money to create a medicinal chemistry lab, which together with existing infrastructure will become the Antibacterial Drug Discovery Accelerator.

Arix Bioscience, a London-based biotech firm, is collaborating with the University of Leeds and two German technology organizations—Lead Discovery Center and Max Planck ­Innovation—to develop drugs for treating metabolic diseases. Arix will fund the activity.