Business Roundup

Mitsubishi Rayon has agreed to sell its 50,000-metric-ton-per-year acrylic fiber plant in Ningbo, China, for $17 million to two companies: the Chinese firm Nantong Zhongxin Textile & Dyeing, which will have a 75% stake, and the Hong Kong firm Ford­king, which will buy the rest. The facility started up in 2005 but was idled in May because of poor market conditions in the country.

Dow Chemical has completed the sale of its Morton International salt business to German salt and fertilizer maker K+S Group. Separately, Dow completed the sale of a Malaysian joint venture, Optimal Group, to its partner Petronas. Dow says that proceeds of $1.6 billion from K+S and $660 million from Petronas will be used to reduce debt from its recent purchase of Rohm and Haas.

Formosa Plastics has settled with the Department of Justice over air, water, and hazardous waste violations at its Point Comfort, Texas, and Baton Rouge, La., polyvinyl chloride plants. The company has agreed to spend $10 million on pollution controls and pay a penalty of $2.8 million.

Kemira has opened an R&D center at the Technology Enterprise Park on the campus of Georgia Institute of Technology. There the company will conduct research in paper tissue and recycled fibers, petroleum, mining, defoamers, and polymers.

Lonza and the special committee of independent directors of Patheon, a Canadian contract services firm, have 
announced an extension until Oct. 15 of the 
due diligence period regarding Lonza’s $450 million bid to acquire Patheon. Lonza’s offer has been rejected by 
private equity firm JLL Partners, which owns 57% of the shares in Patheon.

Academia Sinica, a research institution based in Taiwan, has joined the Infectious Disease Research Institute and Eli Lilly & Co. as part of the not-for-profit Lilly TB Drug Discovery Initiative. Academia Sinica will collaborate on target-based screening to discover new tuberculosis drugs.

BioFocus DPI, the contract research subsidiary of Galapagos, has initiated a drug discovery collaboration with Schering-Plough worth $4.5 million over a one-year period. BioFocus will perform medicinal chemistry with supporting biology and other services.

Codexis has closed its site in Jülich, Germany, which it acquired in 2005, as part of an effort to “build a stable and sustainable company.” The biocatalysis firm will soon offer its enzymes and chiral intermediates through an electronic store. All catalog inquiries will also be routed through this system.

Eisai and the Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative have signed a drug development and licensing agreement for ravuconazole, an antifungal discovered by Eisai for the treatment of Chagas disease. Chagas disease is a fatal infectious disease prevalent in Latin America and the Caribbean.