Stepan buys Peter Cremer's Singapore manufacturing assets

Stepan aims to restart production of the Jurong Island plant by end of 2011.

Stepan Company on Friday announced it has acquired the manufacturing assets of Peter Cremer GmbH's 100,000 ton per year methyl ester plant located on Singapore's Jurong Island, according to a Stepan report.

"Methyl esters are a core building block of Stepan's surfactant business and the acquisition of this asset on Singapore's Jurong Island provides a great opportunity to reach our global customer base with methyl esters and value added derivatives," said F. Quinn Stepan Jr., President and CEO of Stepan Company.

"Our plan is to install methyl ester fractionation capability on the site in order to supply our customers and our internal surfactant needs globally with fractionated methyl esters and derivatives made from tropical oils available in the region. The site acquisition and the further planned capital investments will firmly position Stepan for continued global growth leveraging our strong position in methyl esters," he added.

Stepan intends to re-start production of the Jurong Island plant by the end of 2011 after adding fractionation capabilities to the plant's current production capabilities. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Stepan Company, headquartered in Northfield, Illinois, is a leading producer of specialty and intermediate chemicals used in household, industrial, personal care, agricultural, food and insulation related products. The common and the convertible preferred stocks are traded on the New York and Chicago Stock Exchanges under the symbols SCL and SCLPR.