Lanxess Nabs DSM’s Elastomers Division …

Lanxess has reached an agreement to buy DSM’s elastomers business for more than $440 million. Expected to close in early 2011, the deal includes an ethylene-propylene diene rubber (EPDM) plant in the Netherlands with annual capacity of 160,000 metric tons and one in Brazil with 40,000 metric tons of capacity. DSM Elastomers employs 420 people and is expected to have sales this year of nearly $510 million. Lanxess currently can produce a total of 120,000 metric tons of EPDM in the U.S. and Germany. The sale marks the final step in a divestment program DSM began in 2007 to focus on the materials and life sciences.