Business Roundup

Lanxess plans to increase capacity for its Macrolex dyes for plastics in Leverkusen, Germany, by 25% by the end of 2018. Set to cost more than $6 million, the expansion is needed to meet new demand, particularly from customers in Asia, Lanxess says.

Toray Industries has bought a 350,000-m² plot of land in Sri City near Chennai in southeastern India. The plot will initially be home to a spun bond polypropylene plant. Toray also plans to build engineering plastics facilities there.

Hitachi Chemical is one of the investors in Ionic Materials, a Boston-area start-up that recently raised $65 million to commercialize solid electrolytes for batteries. Hitachi wants to develop anode materials that work with solid electrolytes.

Pilbara Minerals, which is building a lithium mine in Australia, has received a $62 million investment from POSCO, a South Korean conglomerate. POSCO gets rights to future Pilbara lithium chemical output.

SK Chemicals will spin off its vaccine business and perhaps list it on a stock market. The South Korean firm says the move will strengthen the business by giving it its own name, identity, and investors.

GeneTx Biotherapeutics has been launched by Foundation for Angelman Syndrome Therapeutics, an advocacy group for the rare disease. GeneTx will pursue an investigational antisense drug, GTX-101, discovered at Texas A&M.

BenevolentAI, which applies artificial intelligence to science, has acquired a drug R&D facility in Cambridge, England, from Proximagen. BenevolentAI founder Ken Mulvany is a former CEO of Proximagen.

Takeda Pharmaceutical, the University of Washington, and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center are forming a drug discovery alliance. The pact is intended to give academic scientists access to Takeda’s drug discovery capabilities.