Lubrizol will transfer its metalworking additives business from Spartanburg, S.C., to its Wickliffe, Ohio, headquarters in the third quarter of 2009. The Spartanburg area has been a key location for Lubrizols metalworking additives for a decade, following acquisitions of companies and facilities in the region.
The move will create a stronger, more collaborative research environment across the industrial additives product line, which includes metalworking, industrial gear oil, grease and hydraulics, Lubrizol spokeswoman Julie Young told Lube Report. It will also bring the metalworking group closer to the sales force. Once this move is completed, no additional metalworking activity will occur in Spartanburg.
According to Young, Lubrizol will only move the metalworking laboratory, and the company has offered 12 lab-related employees employment at the Wickliffe facility.
The Lubrizol Advanced Materials manufacturing facility in Spartanburg, which makes products for the personal care, plastics and coating industries, will remain at its location on Brooks Boulevard, she added.
In 1997, Lubrizol acquired Gateway Additives in Spartanburg from Jack Kimes, who became Lubrizols global general manager for the metalworking segment. Gateway manufactured rust preventives, emulsifiers, corrosion inhibitors and extreme pressure additives, including the Addco and Syn-Ester brands.
In 2000, Lubrizol acquired RPM Inc.s Alox metalworking additives business, relocating its product manufacturing to Lubrizols Painesville, Ohio, manufacturing plant in 2001. Alox later moved its operations from Niagara Falls, N.Y., to Spartanburg.
In 2003 Lubrizol acquired a Spartanburg multi-purpose chemical production facility from Specialty Industrial Products, which had been owned by bankrupt Specialty Industrial Products. In addition to 104 adjacent acres, the facility included two plants on 16 acres, where SIP had made specialty surfactants and emulsifiers used in lubricants and metalworking fluids, as well as by the textile, personal care, food processing and pharmaceutical industries.