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LANXESS 23/03/2007

LANXESS to increase prices for ion exchange resins Construction of a new production unit in Asia planned

Leverkusen - Effective April 1, 2007, LANXESS’s Ion Exchange Resins business unit will increase its prices worldwide for the Lewatit® and Ionac® ion exchange product groups by four to six percent - depending on the energy and raw material requirement in the manufacture of the grade concerned. The reasons for the price rises are the continued very high cost of the raw materials and the increase in energy prices, which also lead to more expensive transportation.

To benefit even more strongly from the growing demand in Asia, LANXESS is planning to make an eight-digit investment in a new facility for producing ion exchange resins. This was announced by the Chairman of the Board of Management, Axel C. Heitmann, at the Financial News Conference last Tuesday.

Like existing plants of this type, the new facility will provide important products for industrial water treatment, food processing, the purification of water and manufacture of ultrapure water and the remediation of contaminated areas, such as those with a high arsenic content.

To make sure right from the start that site costs for the new ion exchange resins plant in Asia are kept as low as possible, LANXESS has initiated an international bidding process in which sites in China, India and Singapore will participate. For this business unit, the new plant represents the biggest investment since the late 1990s.

Ion Exchange Resins is one of the LANXESS business units that achieved total sales in 2006 of less than EUR 200 million.