Investments Advance Dow’s Innovation Agenda; Demonstrate Continued
Commitment to the Region
The Dow Chemical Company (NYSE: DOW) today signed two agreements to
advance the Company’s strategic, innovation agenda in the Kingdom of
Saudi Arabia (KSA) which will bring leading edge technologies to KSA
that support the Kingdom’s Vision 2030 economic diversification and
advanced manufacturing development plan.
Dow signed an agreement to construct a state-of-the-art manufacturing
facility to produce a range of polymers for coatings and water-treatment
applications, and a memorandum of understanding for a feasibility study
related to a proposed investment in the Company’s Performance Silicones
franchise.
Andrew
Liveris, Dow’s chairman and chief executive officer, signed the
agreements at an event in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, attended by U.S.
President Donald J. Trump, His Majesty, King Salman Bin Abdulaziz
Al-Saud, Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, His Royal Highness, the
Deputy Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammad bin Salman bin Abdulaziz
Al-Saud, and other distinguished guests.
“Dow has been a long-term strategic partner in Saudi Arabia for nearly
four decades and is the largest foreign investor in the country,” said Liveris.
“Through our global and regional experience and expertise, we have
unmatched capabilities to deliver high value, innovative solutions that
support the Kingdom in key growth areas that help advance the Saudi’s
Vision 2030 plan designed to create a vibrant society and a thriving
diversified economy.”
Located in the PlasChem Park in Jubail, the coatings facility will
service the needs of the Saudi Arabian market with an innovative range
of acrylic-based polymers for industrial and architectural coatings and
water-treatment and detergent applications.
The investment will create approximately 1,000 jobs during peak
construction and approximately 100 high-skilled, full-time operations
jobs in the Kingdom, ultimately growing local manufacturing and
sustainable economic growth.
The new coatings facility will complement Dow’s existing coatings
capabilities in the Middle East, which include an existing facility at
Jebel Ali, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
The proposed silicones investment will include constructing a fully
integrated, world-scale siloxanes and high performance silicones complex
geared towards markets and industries such as home and personal care,
automotive, high performance building and construction, solar energy,
medical devices, and oil and gas. When complete the complex will support
the economic impact of KSA through the creation of approximately 350
full-time, technology-skilled jobs.
This move will serve to further integrate the former Dow Corning
silicones business into Dow, and will accelerate the development of new
hybrid materials which will be unique, technology rich solutions for
regional-specific needs. For example, the Middle East is home to many of
the world’s largest and tallest buildings, which utilize high
performance glass bonding technologies from Dow Silicones. Dow was
recently awarded the contract for supply of silicones sealants for the
structural glazing façade of the Jeddah Tower in KSA. Construction of
the façade will start later this year. Upon completion, the Jeddah Tower
will be the tallest building in the world and will utilize
state-of-the-art silicones technology from Dow to realize its futuristic
architectural design.
These investments are another example of Dow’s long-term strategy in the
Kingdom and region.
Dow maintains several joint ventures in the region including Sadara
Chemical Company, a joint venture with Saudi Arabian Oil Company (Saudi
Aramco). Comprising 26 manufacturing units, Sadara is one of the world’s
largest integrated chemical facilities and the largest ever built in a
single phase.
Sadara has completed construction on all of its 26 manufacturing units
with 19 units either in operating or start up mode. Five units are fully
up and running – marking the commercialization of Sadara’s entire
plastics franchise. And all remaining units are on track for a sequenced
start-up throughout 2017 to meet rising demand in Asia, Africa, the
Middle East, India, and Eastern Europe.
The complex possesses flexible cracking capabilities and will produce
more than 3 million metric tons of high-value performance plastics and
specialty chemical products, capitalizing on rapidly growing markets
such as transportation, infrastructure, packaging and consumer products.
The performance-focused products will add new value chains to the
Kingdom’s vast petroleum reserves, resulting in the diversification of
the economy and region.
Sadara employs more than 4,000 talented Saudis and foreign nationals,
and will help diversify the economy by adding value to the Kingdom’s
vast petroleum reserves and making chemical products not produced before
in the Middle East. Dow has estimated that the project will create
14,000 new jobs in Saudi Arabia, ~4,000 of which are from direct
employment and the rest indirectly.
Other joint ventures in the region include a joint venture with Juffali
& Brothers, and Saudi Acrylic Monomer Company (SAMCo). Additional
strategic investments include agreements with King Abdullah University
of Science and Technology (KAUST) to construct a new Dow
Middle East Research and Development Center, and a Reverse Osmosis
manufacturing facility – the first unit of its kind outside of the
United States.
In June, 2016, Dow became the first company to receive
a trading license from the Government of Saudi Arabia, allowing 100
percent ownership in the country’s trading sector.
About Dow
Dow (NYSE: DOW) combines the power of science and technology to
passionately innovate what is essential to human progress. The Company
is driving innovations that extract value from material, polymer,
chemical and biological science to help address many of the world's most
challenging problems, such as the need for fresh food, safer and more
sustainable transportation, clean water, energy efficiency, more durable
infrastructure, and increasing agricultural productivity. Dow's
integrated, market-driven portfolio delivers a broad range of
technology-based products and solutions to customers in 175 countries
and in high-growth sectors such as packaging, infrastructure,
transportation, consumer care, electronics, and agriculture. In 2016,
Dow had annual sales of $48 billion and employed approximately 56,000
people worldwide. The Company's more than 7,000 product families are
manufactured at 189 sites in 34 countries across the globe. References
to "Dow" or the "Company" mean The Dow Chemical Company and its
consolidated subsidiaries unless otherwise expressly noted. More
information about Dow can be found at www.dow.com.
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