Business Roundup

ExxonMobil and SABIC have formed a joint venture to pursue the ethylene cracker they want to build in San Patricio County, Texas. The project was announced in 2016. Pending environmental permits, it will open by 2021 or 2022.

Mitsui Chemicals will write off $130 million from the value of the dental materials business it bought in 2013 for $576 million from the German metal chemistry firm Heraeus. Sales forecasts for existing products didn’t pan out, and the launch of new products is behind schedule, Mitsui says.

Italmatch has agreed to acquire the metalworking fluid business of Richmond, Va.-based Afton Chemical for an undisclosed sum. The deal includes facilities in Bedford Park, Ill., and Manchester, England, and business assets in India and China.

ICL, an Israeli industrial chemical maker, has invested in CropX, an Israeli firm that offers farmers a combination of soil sensor technology and analytics. ICL says CropX complements its fertilizer business.

Nanoco, a British firm with technology for manufacturing cadmium-free nanoscale quantum dots, has launched a subsidiary, Nanoco 2D Materials, to develop and commercialize materials for 2-D applications. Nanoco 2D Materials is collaborating with scientists at the University of Manchester.

Agilent Technologies will acquire Genohm, a Swiss provider of laboratory information management software with about 40 employees. Agilent says Genohm’s SLIMS software will fit with its OpenLAB products and help boost its presence in the genomics market.

NatureWorks, which produces the biobased polymer polylactic acid in Blair, Neb., has named Richard Altice as its CEO, replacing Marc Verbruggen, who retired in 2017. Altice was previously an executive at PolyOne.

Gilead Sciences will collaborate with Google sister company Verily Life Sciences to probe the immunological basis of inflammatory disease. The partners will use Verily’s Immunoscape technology for profiling inflammatory disease.