Crompton Corp. and Great Lakes Chemical Corp. announced last week that they plan to adopt the name Chemtura Corp. following the completion of their proposed merger. Officials said the name is a combination of the words chemical and future. Crompton and Great Lakes announced their proposed merger in March. U.S. anti-trust regulators declined to object to the deal, but the companies are still awaiting clearance from European authorities. If approved, the combination would create a $3.7 billion spe...

Fuchs Petrolub AG on Friday reported that its profit for the first quarter of 2005 increased 42.4 percent from the same period of 2004, an improvement attributed to increased sales, cost cutting and a new accounting practice. The worlds largest independent lubricant producer, Fuchs recorded 275 million (U.S. $348 million) in sales revenue for the three months ended March 31, up 3 percent from the first three months of 2004. Internal growth – mostly in the Americas – accounted for a 2...

EDINBURGH – Lubricant sales volumes in the European Union declined 3.3 percent in the first nine months of 2004, compared to the same period of 2003, according to EuropaLub, a European lubricants organization. Much of the decline is attributed to a 13 percent slide in process oil sales volumes. Germany led with an 8 percent drop in total lube sales; sales in both Italy and the United Kingdom declined about 4.5 percent. At the European Lubricating Grease Institutes Annual General Meeting he...

HOUSTON – APIs 2004 engine oil Aftermarket Audit Program uncovered significant nonconformance by two licensees out of 529 total license holders, the API Lubricants Committee learned at its May 10 meeting here. One company met follow-up requirements, and the other unidentified companys license was canceled. API – the Washington, D.C.-based American Petroleum Institute – licenses motor oil marketers to use its trademarked starburst and/or donut symbols indicating conformance with...

As Eastern Europe moves westward in a political sense, Western manufacturers are moving eastward in a physical sense. And that spells opportunity for metalworking fluid producers in terms of dollars and cents – or rather zlotych, lei and korun. That is the prognosis of a new study from Kline and Co. consultants, which predicts that fluid demand will grow at healthy rates in Eastern Europe for the next five years, while falling in the western part of the continent. Outside of Russia, Easter...