Ashland Inc. and its joint-venture partner Süd-Chemie AG have completed the merger of their foundry chemical assets into a new global organization, ASK Chemicals GmbH.
ASK Chemicals, headquartered in Hilden, Germany, offers resins, binding agents, finishing tools, additives, feeder heads, filters, separating agents, metallurgical additives and cores to metalcasters in Europe, the Americas, and Asia. The product lines are drawn from the two organizations’ established lines of business as well as from their longtime joint venture, also known as ASK Chemicals.
According to the definitive merger agreement concluded earlier this year, the operations being combined into the ASK Chemicals GmbH includes: the Ashland Casting Solutions assets in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Brazil, China, Japan, the U.K., Spain, Portugal, Italy, India and Korea; Sud-Chemie's Foundry Products and Specialty Resins business, including SKW Giesserei GmbH, WD-Giesserei-Technik GmbH, Tecpro Corp. Inc., Sud-Chemie Hi-Tech Ceramics Inc., Ajay Metachem Sud-Chemie Pvt. Ltd., and parts of Jiangsu Sud-Chemie Chemical Materials Co. Ltd.; and the companies belonging to the existing joint venture, Ashland-Sudchemie-Kernfest GmbH, and its subsidiaries (AS Group).
When the merger agreement was settled in July, Süd-Chemie AG chairman Dr. Gunter von Au, said combining the firms assets will improve their customer-service capabilities in established markets (Europe, North America) and in emerging industrial markets (China, India, Brazil.): "Together, we shall be in a better position to meet the high technological demands of our worldwide customers based on innovative solutions and targeted efficiency enhancement,” he explained.
The plan to consolidate the product lines was first introduced in 2008, but it was not finalized until earlier this year. Both Ashland and Süd-Chemie hold a fifty-percent share in ASK Chemicals GmbH. Süd-Chemie has management control over the new organization.