micro-management, human resources, APIC, commodity chemicals, CEOs, credit control, financial meltdown
Asian Chemical Connections
If manufacturers started buying up their suppliers….
This excellent article from The Economist about vertical integration got me thinking that if, say, auto makers start buying up parts suppliers in developed markets (in developing markets the plastics processing industry is too fragmented) we could end up facing a whole new set of industry dynamics. Buying up your supplier, or at least offering […]
How to make money in a downturn Part 1
John Cusack, Kate Beckinsale, antidumping petitions, trade protection, living in cloud cuckoo land
Work can be the death of you
My dear old mother used to often say “what’s the world coming to?” as if life was constantly getting worse. But for South Korean workers – and for workers everywhere in Asia – expectations of employers have long been unreasonable. Tied into this is loyalty, “face”, pride and ridiculously long and often unproductive hours that […]
Asian biofuels face a big crisis
After all the optimism, all the hype and a lot of investors’ money, the industry has shot itself in the foot by failing to build demand ahead of supply. Plus the negativity caused by food versus fuel and environmental counter-arguments to supporting this current generation of technologies is making some Asian governments hesitate on providing […]
Is the world heading for a naphtha crisis?
Quite possiby says International e-Chem and Wood Mackenzie in a new study which predicts that by 2015, China could have a deficit of as much as 35m tonnes. When you consider that total global output is around 300m tonne/year, this is quite staggering. On paper, China should be balanced on naphtha because of a huge […]
The Middle East may set polyolefins pricing
This was the warning from Bob Bauman of Nexant ChemSystems at last week’s 25th Annual Petrochemical Conference in Houston, Texas. Read below for some rather gloomy predictions of where markets could be heading in 2011-12
Basell predicts tough times for polyolefins in 2009-10
Paul Cherry of Basell gave an excellent paper at the recent ICIS Olefins Conference – Download file Paul offers some hints on how to survive the next downturn, and provides some sobering predictions on operating rates. I bet that after 2009-10, or whenever the next downturn arrives, South Korea, Taiwan and Japan will further restructure. […]
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