Who Is Fittest for the Future

Differentiating Technologies, Especially Cell Culture Fermentation. Within conventional chemistry, there are a number of niche technologies that 

Fine Chemicals The Industry and the Business, by Peter Poliak Copyright 2007 by John Wiley Sons, Inc. 

Adopting these criteria to 12 leading fine-chemical companies (resp. business units) leads to the classification as per Table 20.1. shows a wide spread between the best performer, Lonza, with a total score of 5 (out of a theoretical maximum of 7), and the worst performer, Clariant (now Archimica), which scored 0. Other conclusions are that fine chemicals are the core business of the two tier I companies. Moreover, companies with unfavorable prospects prevail two-thirds total a score of 2 or less. The majority of them have undergone a substantial reshuffling lately five have changed ownership or have been split off or sold. Evidently management has recognized that they were not fit for the future. 

In a keynote address delivered at Informex 2003, Andrew Liveris, now CEO of Dow Chemical, presented a list of seven companies that would still be top players in 2006, namely, Akzo Nobei/Diosynth, Avecia, BASF, Degussa, DSM, Dowpharma, and Lonza. Implicitly, he predicted that Bayer, Boehringer-Ingelheim, Cambrex, Clariant, and Rhodia Chirex would fail behind. The underlying metrics for the classification were not given [2]. 

Tier Company Relative Size of Business Differentiating Technologies Presence in Asia Total Remarks 

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