Wacker Chemie

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Wacker Chemie AG

logo
legal form Corporation
ISIN DE000WCH8881
founding 1914
Seat Munich , GermanyGermanyGermany 
management
  • Rudolf Staudigl, CEO
    Christian Hartel
    Tobias Ohler
    Auguste Willems
Number of employees 14,658 (2019)
sales € 4.93 billion (2019)
Branch chemistry
Website www.wacker.com
As of January 28, 2020

The Wacker Chemie AG , headquartered in Munich, is the parent company of a global German chemicals group , which was founded in 1914 and is majority controlled by the family Wacker. The group operates 23 production sites in Europe, America and Asia and sells its products in over 100 countries.

Wacker Chemie has four business units that are based on two main raw materials, ethene and silicon . The Polysilicon division produces high-purity polysilicon for the solar market. Silicones serves markets in the construction industry, automotive, paints and varnishes, textiles and paper. Starting with ethene, the Polymers division produces the intermediate stages VAM ( vinyl acetate ) and VAE ( vinyl acetate-ethylene ) and primarily supplies the construction industry with polymer powders. Biosolutions focuses on biotechnologically manufactured products and also converts ethene into ketene .

history

Founding years

The foundation stone for today's company was laid by Alexander Wacker on March 25, 1903 when the research company Consortium für elektrochemische Industrie GmbH registered in Nuremberg . The trained businessman Wacker was previously employed as general director and partner of S. Schuckert & Co. in the fast-growing sector of power generation.

In the run-up to this, the company had stepped up the production of calcium carbide for the production of ethyne (old substance name: acetylene). This was intended to improve the supply of light to the remote larger centers and replace the petroleum . With the construction of overhead power lines , however, this goal became obsolete, and the still young carbide factories were threatened with extinction. Together with Hugo von Maffei, Alexander Wacker took over three carbide plants and the laboratory located on the Schuckert site in Nuremberg, in order to find new ways of using ethyne as quickly as possible. With the development of a process to economically produce tetrachloroethane from chlorine and ethyne , the raw material basis for the production of the solvents trichloroethene and tetrachloroethene was created. Many other basic chemical processes have been developed and in some cases adopted by other companies for marketing. A continuous process for the synthesis of acetaldehyde from acetylene and water under mercury catalysis was developed by 1913 (so-called first Wacker process) and later also for the production of acetic acid from it on an industrial scale.

On October 13, 1914, at the age of 67, Alexander Wacker founded Dr. Alexander Wacker Society for electrochemical industry in the legal form of a limited partnership , which should offer the missing possibilities for the industrial manufacture of the products. The rights to use the hydropower of the lower Alz , acquired in 1913, were intended to ensure the supply of electrical energy with which a plant in Burghausen was to be operated. However, the First World War interrupted the plans until 1915. During a conversation with representatives of the Bayer paint factories in August 1915, it became clear that Wacker would be able to supply the acetone that Bayer had lacked with the Burghauser plant. August 1915 decided to build an acetone plant in Burghausen.

On December 1, 1916, production started in Burghausen, and acetone began to be manufactured on January 2, 1917. In December 1916, the Elektrochemische Werke Breslau in Tschechnitz was founded to secure the carbide supply for the Burghausen plant. In 1918 the laboratory moved from Nuremberg to Munich and the trichlorethylene plant in Burghausen was put into operation and Alzwerke GmbH was founded.

Between the wars and the Second World War

In the inter-war years, the company was able to expand its product range and achieve numerous technological advances, but also needed capital to build the lower Alz Canal and the run-of-river power station of Alzwerke GmbH near Burghausen. 1921 took over the Farbwerke vorm. Meister, Lucius & Brüning AG (Frankfurt-Höchst) took over half of the company shares that were owned by IG Farben in 1926 . When IG Farben was broken up in 1952, 49% of the shares came to the re-founded Farbwerke Hoechst AG (since 1974 Hoechst AG ).

In 1924 the Alz Canal broke over a length of almost 200 m. In the same year, the Stetten salt mine was leased to meet the demand for rock salt; In 1960 the factory was purchased. In 1926 the Ferrowerk Mückenberg in Niederlausitz was acquired, followed by the commissioning of an acetylene plant in Röthenbach an der Pegnitz (1929), the commissioning of a training workshop in Burghausen (1930), the takeover of Elektroschmelzwerk Kempten AG (1933) from Tüllfabrik Flöha AG and the establishment of the Mückenberg chemical plant (1938). Also in 1938, Wacker began manufacturing polyvinyl chloride (PVC) in Burghausen based on Herbert Berg's pioneering work .

Like numerous other companies, Wacker profited from wartime production during World War II , particularly in the manufacture of synthetic rubber . In the late years of the war, laboratory facilities in Munich were destroyed by Allied bombing. Nearly all production facilities were closed at the end of the war. In Burghausen, production facilities were dismantled by the occupying powers , and the plants in Mückenberg and Tschechnitz were expropriated and nationalized.

1945 until the IPO in 2006

After the Second World War, Wacker began research into silicones . The first silane reactor was put into operation in 1949 and the range of silicone products was significantly expanded over the next few years.

In 1953, the production of high-purity polycrystalline silicon began in Burghausen. In 1960 the production capacity was around 1 ton per year, in 2004 it was 5000 tons and thus had a world market share of just under 20 percent. The polysilicon, now manufactured by the Wacker Polysilicon division , is used to manufacture electronic wafers and solar cells . Since 2000 there has been a special production of solar silicon, which does not have to be quite as pure as the silicon for electronic circuits.

In 1965, Wacker founded Wacker Chemicals Corp., New York, which four years later acquired a 33% share in SWS Silicones Corp. in Adrian acquired.

In 1969 the production of fumed silica (HDK) started.

In 1981 the production of silicones started in Brazil. In 1985 Wacker increased its stake in SWS-Silicones Corp. to 50% and a few years later founded Wacker Silicones Corp. in Adrian . In 1998 the Nünchritz location was acquired by Hüls AG , which was gradually expanded in the following years with additional capacities for the production of silicones. At the end of 2008, Wacker announced that it would build another plant for the production of polysilicon here.

In 1999, Wacker began entering biotechnological production with the commissioning of a cyclodextrin plant in Eddyville , Iowa.

In 2001 the Wacker family succeeded in increasing their stake to 51% and regaining the majority in the chemical company.

In August 2005, the Wacker family bought back the remaining shares in Hoechst Beteiligungsverwaltungs GmbH, which is now Sanofi-Aventis Beteiligungsverwaltungs GmbH. In November 2005, Wacker-Chemie GmbH was converted into a stock corporation. Since then the company has operated as Wacker Chemie AG.

IPO to date

On April 10, 2006, the company went public. To finance the buyback of Hoechst, around 29% of the ordinary shares were sold for around 1.2 billion euros. Between June 19, 2006 and June 24, 2019, the company was listed in the German mid-cap index MDAX and has been on the SDAX since then . Also in 2006, the establishment of a joint venture with Dow Corning was announced, with the aim of establishing a siloxane production facility in China. In 2010 the corresponding facilities were opened.

At the beginning of 2008, the shares of Airproducts Inc. in two joint ventures were completely taken over. At the Annual General Meeting in May 2008, the long-standing CEO Peter-Alexander Wacker, great-grandson of the founder, moved to the Supervisory Board. In 2008, the company had 15,922 employees (as of December 31, 2008) and generated sales of 4.298 billion euros.

On June 4, 2010, Wacker Chemie AG signed a contract to purchase silicon production at the Holla (Trøndelag) site of the Norwegian FESIL Group for around EUR 65 million. In 2010, the Korean silicone manufacturer Lucky Silicones was taken over by Henkel ; the stake in the joint venture in Planar Solutions was sold to the joint venture partner Fujifilm towards the end of the year .

In July 2011, Wacker Chemie parted ways with its tire release agents business. Rhein Chemie Rheinau GmbH - a subsidiary of Lanxess - acquires rights and customer contracts for this business, with which Wacker had previously achieved sales of several million.

In October 2011, Wacker Chemie commissioned a production facility at its Nünchritz plant that is expected to produce 15,000 tons of polysilicon per year . The investments amounted to approx. 900 million euros.

On June 11, 2015, Wacker Chemie listed its wafer subsidiary Siltronic on the stock exchange. After the IPO, a majority of 57.8% in Siltronic remained. In 2017, Wacker still held a minority stake of 30.8%. In 2018, Siltronic was no longer part of Wacker.

Group overview

Current group structure

Wacker Chemie AG is divided into four business areas. They bear entrepreneurial responsibility for their area. Wacker Chemie has 22 affiliated companies , four of which are based in Germany . The Siltronic AG, based in Munich is the largest affiliated companies and is also the parent company of the business unit of the same name.

The four business areas and their products

Corporate governance

Board
  • Rudolf Staudigl, CEO, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Siltronic AG, Member of the Supervisory Board of Groz-Beckert KG, Member of the Advisory Board of Deutsche Bank AG, Chairman of the Bavarian Chemical Associations
  • Christian Hartel, Labor Director
  • Tobias Ohler, Chief Financial Officer, former member of the Executive Board of Siltronic AG
  • Auguste Willems, member of the Bavarian State Advisory Board of TÜV Süd AG
Supervisory board

Shareholder structure

The company's share capital is divided into around 52.2 million bearer shares . The majority of the shares are permanently owned and controlled by the founding family.

shareholder proportion of
Dr. Alexander Wacker Familiengesellschaft mbH 55.64%
Blue Elephant Holding GmbH (Peter-Alexander Wacker, Clara Wacker) 10.86%
own shares 4.75%
Free float 28.75%

Locations

f1Georeferencing Map with all coordinates: OSM | WikiMap

  • Headquarters Munich ( location )
  • Consortium Munich (Central Research) ( Location )

production

Nünchritz plant, Saxony
Germany
rest of Europe
Asia
Wacker Chemical Corporation, Adrian MI
America

Cooperations

In October 2005, Wacker-Chemie founded a joint venture with Dymatic Chemical in Shunde, China .

In the USA, Wacker founded the joint ventures Wacker Polymer Systems and Air Products Polymers with Air Products and Chemicals. In 2008 the shares of Air Products were fully repurchased.

In Japan, a joint venture was established with Asahi Chemical Industry and the semiconductor activities of Nippon Steel were acquired.

In mid-2006, Wacker Chemie agreed with the South Korean company Samsung to build a joint factory to manufacture silicon wafers for the semiconductor industry.

In 2007, a joint venture was established with Schott Solar to manufacture wafers from hyperpure polycrystalline silicon ( WACKER SCHOTT Solar GmbH ). On September 30, 2009, Wacker Chemie AG withdrew from the joint venture.

After a four-year construction period, Dow Corning Corporation and Wacker Chemie AG will open their joint silicone production facility in Zhangjiagang , China, in mid-2010 . From this location, the two companies serve the rapidly growing demand for silicones in China and Asia. With a combined investment volume of USD 1.8 billion, nominal capacities for siloxane and fumed silica of around 210,000 tons per year are to be achieved.

literature

  • Egon Falbesaner: Wacker-Chemie and its founder. For the company's 75th anniversary. In: Oettinger Land, 9/1989, pp. 173–190.
  • Rüdiger Liedtke: Who Owns the Republic? Corporations and their interdependencies in the globalized economy 2007 Names Figures Facts . Eichborn Verlag, Frankfurt a. M., October 2006, ISBN 3-8218-5658-0 , pp. 468-471.
  • Wacker Chemie AG (Ed.): People Markets Molecules - The Wacker Chemie Success Formula 1914–2014 (PDF; 38 MB). Piper Verlag GmbH, Munich 2014.

Web links

Commons : Wacker Chemie  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Annual Report 2019. Accessed July 5, 2020 .
  2. ↑ a b wacker.com: Wacker divisions
  3. ^ Cabinet minutes of the federal government of June 19, 1952 , limited preview on Google Books
  4. ↑ Karen Königsberger: "Networked System"? The history of the Deutsches Museum 1945–1980 presented in the chemistry and nuclear physics departments (=  historical sciences . Volume 22 ). Herbert Utz Verlag, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-8316-0898-0 , Chapter 1.3.3 Herbert Berg (1969–1980), pp. 55 f .
  5. ↑ www.fundinguniverse.com: Wacker-Chemie GmbH Company History .
  6. ↑ A Historical Review of Silicones www.chemiedidaktik.uni-wuppertal.de.
  7. ↑ Focus Money: Wacker Chemie: Silicon Wacker. Issue 14, 2006.
  8. ↑ Sanofi-Aventis gives up its stake in Wacker Chemie Sanofi-Aventis.
  9. ↑ Press release from May 8, 2005 www.pressetext.at.
  10. ↑ Wacker Chemie AG: WACKER buys silicon-metal production in Norway. June 7, 2010, accessed November 10, 2010 .
  11. ^ Wacker Chemie AG: WACKER Chemie AG - Annual Report. (PDF; 4.3 MB) Retrieved March 22, 2011 .
  12. ^ Rhein Chemie: Rhein Chemie takes over tire release agent business from Wacker. July 7, 2011, accessed July 14, 2011 .
  13. ↑ 500 new jobs. Wacker is investing in the Nünchritz site ( memento from August 4, 2012 in the archive.today web archive ). In: mdr.de , October 10, 2011. Retrieved October 10, 2011.
  14. ↑ Information from the online portal of the Handelsblatt ; Retrieved June 12, 2015.
  15. ↑ Siltronic: History. Retrieved June 11, 2019 .
  16. ^ Wacker Chemie AG: Facts & Figures on the Share. Accessed December 15, 2018 (German).
  17. ^ Wacker Chemie AG: Shareholder structure. Accessed December 15, 2018 (German).
  18. ↑ BaFin - Significant shares of voting rights according to Sections 33, 38 and 39 of the Securities Trading Act (WpHG). Retrieved December 15, 2018 .
  19. ↑ Locations - Wacker Chemie AG Annual Report 2015. In: reports.wacker.com. Retrieved March 18, 2016 .
  20. ↑ Press release of September 30, 2009 Press release company information.
  21. ^ Dow Corning press release .