SABIC is by no means the only Middle East petrochemicals company finding opportunity abroad. In January 2005, Kuwaiti-U.S. joint venture Equipolymers — a venture between Kuwait's Petrochemical Industries Corporation, a subsidiary of the Kuwait Petroleum Corp., and Michigan-based Dow Chemical Co. — announced it would build a new production facility for PET in Schkopau, Germany, adding 175,000 tons per year to its current production capacity of 450,000 tons. The growth is primarily to serve growing customer demand in central and eastern Europe.
      "The expansion is consistent with Equipolymers' global business growth strategy and our commitment to supply the market for the long term: "We are investing in capacity and making all our European plants competitive, bringing innovation and next generation technology to our customers," said Flavio Terruzzi, Equipolymers CEO and president. "By 2006, we also plan to modernize our Ottana plant in Italy."
      Germany is also the site of the just-opened full-scale engineering thermoplastics facility on the premises of BASF's complex in Schwarzheide by Schenectady, N.Y.-based Cyclics Corp.
      The 70-employee plant was financed through $36.5 million in financing from KfW IPEX-Bank; various grants and subsidies from German government programs totaling $21.3 million; $14 million in equity from Cyclics; and an 80-percent deficiency guarantee from the State of Brandenburg and the Federal Republic of Germany.
      Already, the company is taking steps to bump up the plant's capacity from 2,500 metric tons to 5,000 metric tons by early 2006. But by the fourth quarter of 2005, Cyclics will announce the location of its second, world-scale plant for the production of CBT resin, expected to have an annual capacity five to 10 times that big.
      There has been no decision as to the new plant's location, with a number of sites under consideration. According to a company statement, "proximity to raw materials, low raw material and energy costs, availability of skilled labor, good transportation routes and attractive financial incentives are among the key criteria Cyclics is evaluating in determining the location of the second plant."
      Davy Process Engineering, the engineering firm that led the design and construction of the first plant, is assisting in the site qualification process.