Global chemicals leader shifts focus to remain on top

The increasing global supply and resulting overcapacity of basic chemicals made restructuring a necessity for sector leader Mitsui Chemicals.

Tsutomu Tannowa stepped up to take on this challenge as the president of the chemical giant a year ago.

"After working with basic chemicals and petrochemicals, we are shifting to performance-driven products and pursuing higher quality," he said. "Mobility, healthcare, and food & packaging are our new focus." Mitsui Chemicals is aiming to increase its business in these three fields to a total of 90 percent of the company's revenue.

Although Mitsui Chemicals' focus is global, China remains its top market - with the country currently counting for 24 percent of its total overseas sales. One of its most recent partnerships is a joint venture with Sinopec to establish the world's largest ethylene-propylene-diene terpolymer plant in Shanghai.

"We are not looking to simply expand further and increase our revenue; we are now making a shift to higher-value-added products like EPT, which is very heat-resistant and durable and can be used extensively in automotive parts," said Tannowa. "We can definitely transfer our know-how to China and provide this market with our expertise in eco-friendly products and applications, as the level of interest in this area is fast growing."

Under Tannowa's leadership, Mitsui Chemicals is on the right track. As he said: "It has been a very progressive year for us. We are doing better than anticipated, and outperforming our targets."

group.mitsuichemicals.com

World Eye Reports provided the story.

(China Daily 06/18/2015 page22)