Strategic adjustment of Japanese petrochemical companies aroused widespread concern in the industry

Recently, several major petrochemical manufacturers in Japan have reduced their production of general-purpose petrochemicals through production capacity optimization and restructuring, and have turned to the production of high value-added products to accelerate the transition from the general product market to high value-added products, including automotive, electronics, and electrical and sanitary pharmaceuticals. And high-growth markets such as solar cell materials. At the Asian Petrochemical Conference 2012 held in Bangkok from June 20 to June 21, the strategic adjustment of Japanese companies attracted wide attention from the industry.

In recent years, a large number of low-cost petrochemical products from Middle East manufacturers have entered the Asian market. The continuous appreciation of the Japanese yen has caused the competitiveness of Japanese petrochemical manufacturers to continue to be weakened, and many terminal manufacturers have successively relocated major production bases overseas, in this context. , Japan's petrochemical industry has accelerated the pace of structural adjustment.

According to the medium-term development plan established by Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation at the end of 2011, the company will realize a pretax profit of 400 billion yen (about 5.2 billion U.S. dollars) by fiscal year 2015, focusing on the development of white light-emitting diodes and automotive lithium-ion battery materials. , automotive chemicals, sustainable resources, organic optoelectronic semiconductors, organic solar cells, and personal medical supplies. At present, Mitsubishi Chemical has achieved direct supply of ethylene oxide raw materials to downstream customers, expanding the production capacity of ethylene carbonate and specialty polypropylene. At the same time, Mitsubishi Corporation further strengthened its international cooperation by signing agreements with China Petrochemical Corporation, Saudi Basic Industries Corporation and Thai PTT Corporation, and establishing partnerships in numerous product areas.

Mitsubishi also entered the solar field by acquiring Canadian photovoltaic companies. Currently Mitsubishi Rayon Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of the Mitsubishi Chemical Group, has become the world's largest producer of methyl methacrylate (MMA) and will continue to strengthen its specialty chemicals, including MMA, carbon fiber composite materials, and water environment. In the MMA area, we will continue to expand the scale of MMA monomer and enhance the production capacity of homopolymers and copolymers. In the business of carbon fiber composite materials, we will develop businesses in the fields of automotive and wind power blades to cope with the global market and continue to increase carbon fiber and composite products. Demand.

Sumitomo Chemical's petrochemical production bases are located in Singapore, Saudi Arabia, and Japan. In Singapore, the company's business development focuses on polymers for high-performance automotive components. The company will continue to expand its production capacity of S-SBR, MMA and ethylene vinyl acetate (EVA). The Rabigh petrochemical plant in Saudi Arabia is a joint venture project between Sumitomo Chemical and Saudi Aramco. Not long ago, the two parties announced that they will implement a second-phase energy expansion project with a total investment of approximately US$7 billion. It is expected to be put into operation in the first half of 2016. The expansion project includes new Increase 300,000 tons/year of ethylene production capacity, and produce downstream products including ethylene propylene rubber, thermoplastic polyolefin, MMA, polymethyl methacrylate, low density polyethylene/EVA, paraxylene/benzene and other downstream products. Sumitomo Chemical Co. stated that in the near future, about 53% of the company's sales will come from overseas, and the output of petrochemical products from overseas installations is expected to reach more than 50%.

Mitsui Chemicals' goal is to become the world's leading manufacturer of metallocene linear low density polyethylene and phenolic resin products. To this end, the company decided to build a metallocene linear low-density polyethylene production project in Singapore before 2015, and plans to expand the production capacity of phenol and bisphenol A in China. Mitsui Chemicals will also continue to expand its functional film and sheet businesses and build new installations overseas to meet a variety of end-market needs. It is reported that Mitsui Chemicals will launch a solar cell packaging material plant in Malaysia this summer and plans to build a new thin film factory for electronics industry in Thailand in the second half of 2013.

Asahi Kasei's global strategy focuses on the development of core products such as S-SBR and acrylonitrile. In Thailand, Asahi Kasei and PTT's joint venture in Mata Province with an annual production capacity of 200,000 tons of acrylonitrile units have been put into production by the end of 2011. The company also plans to build a new large-scale acrylonitrile plant with an annual capacity of 245,000 tons in Ulsan, South Korea. It will also establish a joint venture with Saudi Basic Industries to build an acrylonitrile plant with an annual capacity of 200,000 tons and 40,000 tons of sodium cyanide. Device. In addition, the company’s S-SBR plant in Jurong Island, Singapore, is expected to start production in June 2013. The initial annual production capacity will be 50,000 tons, and the second-phase annual production capacity will also be 50,000 tons. The plan is for 2015. Completed in half a year.

Japan’s Ube Chemical’s annual capacity of 20,000 tons caprolactam and synthetic rubber capacity expansion projects in Thailand is also accelerating. Ubeda also said it will consider building other downstream derivative production facilities in Thailand, such as the Nylon 6 plant, polycarbonate diol, and polyurethane dispersions. Ube plans to expand the production capacity of synthetic rubber in Asia and strengthen its position in the synthetic rubber industry through active investment in the Asian market. Currently, Ube's total annual synthetic rubber production capacity in Japan, Chiba, Thailand, and China totals approximately 217,000 tons.

Showa Denko's global development focus is hard disk and graphite electrode business. Showa Denko recently completed expansion of its VGCF plant in Kawasaki and plans to increase its annual output of rare earth alloy raw materials in Vietnam from 200 tons to 600 tons.

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