By DPA,
Berlin : BASF, the world’s biggest chemicals company, unveiled yet another takeover Tuesday, prolonging a string of acquisitions in the midst of the current market slump.
A day after announcing a 581-million-euro ($726 million) bid for Revus Energy, a Norwegian company with 60 oil and gas concessions under the North Sea, BASF said it has agreed to acquire a polyurethane business belonging to Recticel of Belgium.
Analysts say they expect Ludwigshafen-based BASF to report a modest profit increase when it publishes third-quarter figures this Thursday.
BASF has also expressed interest in purchasing Ciba Holding of Switzerland.
Purchasing that company would give BASF a commanding position in paper chemicals and plastic additives.
BASF has made an offer of about $3 billion to shareholders of Ciba Holding. The offer will expire at the end of Tuesday.
The acquisition from Recticel is much smaller. No price was disclosed but a BASF spokesman said it was “a medium double-digit number of million euros”.
The announcement appeared to indicate BASF was still willing to spend on takeovers despite the looming global recession.
The Recticel subsidiary makes polyurethane to “encapsulate” glass, typically to tightly glue car windscreens into a car’s steel frame.
The glass encapsulation technology is used for seven percent of all glass applications in the automotive industry worldwide and will also be used to considerably simplify and speed up the production process of solar panels, the statement said.