German chemical industry sees slowdown
German chemicals industry association VCI sees smaller production, sales and price rises next year, after ending 2005 with production and sales growth well ahead of its own forecasts.

“Our industry is looking ahead to the new year with confidence but it will not be possible to repeat the high growth rates of the present year,” VCI president and Bayer chief executive Werner Wenning said in a speech.
VCI said it expected chemical production to rise by 2.5 per cent in 2006, with prices rising 1 percent. Sales are forecast to rise 3.5 per cent. The figures are a key economic indicator in Germany, where chemicals represent the fourth-largest industrial sector and account for about a tenth of industrial sales.

Borealis to shift HQ
Borealis, a leading provider of plastics solutions, will move its headquarters from Copenhagen (Denmark) to Vienna (Austria) by summer 2006. The move follows a change in ownership structure of the company under which it is now owned 65 per cent by the International Petroleum Investment Company (IPIC) of Abu Dhabi and 35 per cent by OMV Aktiengesellschaft, Austria’s oil and gas company. There will be no changes for customers linked to this move. Borealis will continue to focus on providing innovative, value creating plastics solutions, said a spokesman.

Boost for China textile sector
The new Sino-US textile pact is expected to boost the market share of Chinese textile products in the US to 19.8 per cent by 2008 from 6.7 per cent in 2004, China’s Commerce Ministry has said. China’s market share in the US market will reach 15 per cent in 2006, 17.1 per cent in 2007 and 19.8 per cent in 2008 under growth rates agreed to in the Sino-US textile pact, it said.

GE offers new materials
GE Advanced Materials has introduced a new family of transparent encapsulants and lens materials for optoelectronics applications. The use of optoelectronics, particularly light-emitting diodes (LEDs) is rapidly expanding into a wide array of products, from mobile phones and handheld computers to automotive instrumentation, large screen flat panel display backlights, traffic signals, signage and illumination lighting. Expanded usage, coupled with the requirements of next-generation optoelectronics that are hotter and brighter, are driving demand for new materials that can extend the lifecycle and provide higher performance, it said.

Daihatsu plans assembly plant
Japan’s Daihatsu Motor Company, a compact carmaker majority owned by Toyota Motor Corporation, plans to build an assembly plant in southern Japan to meet growing demand for small cars, the Nihon Keizai business daily said. Daihatsu will build the factory next to an existing plant in Nakatsu, Oita prefecture, some 800 km southwest of Tokyo. The plant is scheduled for completion in 2008 and will have annual production capacity of 150,000 vehicles.

India industrial output up
India’s industrial output accelerated in October, rising 8.5 per cent from a year earlier, helped by robust manufacturing which prompted some analysts to forecast a rise in interest rates to curb inflation. The annual rate of growth in October exceeded September’s revised figure of 6.9 per cent, data showed. Industrial production, which mostly caters to the local population of more than 1 billion, has been growing since 2003 and analysts expect the strong trend to continue for the rest of the year.

$3bn chip unit planned
SemIndia plans to invest $3 billion in a semiconductor chip-making factory in India, with technology from America’s Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), officials from the companies said. AMD will transfer micro-processor and logic manufacturing technology to SemIndia, and may pick up a stake in the proposed plant, Hector Ruiz, chief executive officer of AMD, said. SemIndia, a consortium of overseas Indians, sees Indian demand for semiconductor chips at $30 billion each year by 2015, its chief executive Officer Vinod Agarwal said.

Corus plans
The UK-headquartered Corus, a leading steelmaker, has unveiled plans for a major expansion of it Dutch operations. The company said it had invested 223 million euros at its Ijmuiden plant to expand production for the automotive and construction markets from 2008. Steel prices jumped last year on the back of the Chinese economic boom but they came down in the spring of this year amid sagging demand and client destocking. Europe’s steelmakers responded by cutting production to shield prices and margins as they also faced sharp rises in the prices of iron ore and coal this year.

Heidelberg showcases press equipment
Heidelberg Middle East, the world’s leading solution provider for the print media industry, recently held an event to showcase their state-of-the-art Printmaster GTO 52 press at their showroom on Sheikh Zayed Road, Dubai.
Representatives from 50 different presses were provided an overview on the latest developments in the industry and given a demonstration on the latest model of the Printmaster GTO 52 by a specialist from the Heidelberg plant in Germany. The Heidelberg expert offered tips and explained techniques to improve the quality of printing, efficiency of the equipment and on the overall maintenance process. 
With more than 100,000 printing units shipped, the GTO is the industry’s most commonly sold sheetfed offset press.  Over 60,000 printers across the world use the GTO.

Boubyan buys Omani
Kuwait’s Boubyan Petrochemical said it had bought an Omani pipe and polyethylene manufacturing company for about $11 million.
“Boubyan Petrochemical has bought 100 per cent of Mona Nur Industrial and Trading for RO4.15 million ($10.78 million),” the company said in a statement.
It added that the Omani firm owns a factory for the manufacturing of PVC pipes and polyethylene, which are exported to West Asia, the Gulf region and Africa.

Bosch’s training centre
Bosch AA, the automotive aftermarket equipment business division of Robert Bosch, one of the world’s leading developers of automotive technology and spare parts suppliers, has opened its Service Training Centre at the Dubai Airport Free Zone in conjunction with its regional Middle East office.
The new training centre offers a three-day to two-week technical training courses for the diagnosis, repair and servicing of motor vehicles in which trainees will undergo comprehensive theoretical and intense practical training. The courses are mainly divided into five training categories, namely car technology, diesel technology, test equipment repair and usage, spare parts sales and car service centre management.