The disposal of Dynamit Nobel to Rockwood Specialties Group - which isheadquartered in New Jersey in the US - brought in €2.25 billion to mg's coffers. At the heart of the trimmed-down group will be GEA, which supplies process technology and components for the pharmaceutical, food and petrochemical industries.
Dynamit Nobel makes a broad range of fine chemicals used by the chemical and pharmaceutical industries, but its activities in plastics are not included in the sale, because these activities are focused on the automotive industry. mg is now in the process of selling plastics group Kunststoff to US automotive supplier Flex-N-Gate.
In April, mg and Rockwood signed a deal to bring four of the Dynamit Nobel's business units into the latter's hands. Taken together, the CeramTec, Chemetall, Sachtleben, and Dynamit Nobel Custom Synthesis units accounted for more than three-quarters of Dynamit's operating cash flow in 2003, bringing in revenues of €1.5 billion.
Last October, mg said that it did not have the resources to develop both its chemical and engineering businesses, and would use its exit from the chemicals sector - carried out via the sale of Dynamit and its Solvadis unit - to fund expansion in engineering.