Alpek buys OCTAL for US$ 620 million

Alpek announced on Tuesday an agreement to acquire OCTAL, a major global producer of PET sheets, for $620 million.

According to Intercam Banco, this acquisition integrates Alpek into the high-value PET sheet business segment, closes the gap to achieve its ESG goals and improves its ability to meet the growing PET resin needs of its customers.

The company will buy 100% of the shares of OCTAL for 620 million dollars free of debt.

“The deal would have an immediate material and cumulative impact on EBITDA once customary closing conditions are met, which is expected in the first half of the year,” Intercam Banco added.

Alpek

The acquiring company is a leading petrochemical company with operations in two business segments: «Polyester» (PTA, PET, FPET, and polyester fibers) and «Plastics and Chemicals» (polypropylene, expandable styrenics, specialty chemicals, and industrial chemicals).

Likewise, Alpek is a leading producer of PTA and PET worldwide, one of the largest producers of rPET in the Americas, the third largest producer of expandable polystyrene in the world, and the only producer of polypropylene in Mexico.

In 2020, Alpek recorded revenues of 5,326 million dollars and a Comparable Flow of 601 million dollars.

The company operates 32 plants in the United States, Mexico, Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Chile and the United Kingdom, employing more than 6,000 people.

For Alpek, this acquisition would represent vertical integration into the high-value PET sheet business segment, close the gap towards achieving its ESG goals and enhance its ability to serve its customers’ growing PET resin needs.

For its part, Octal is a major producer of PET sheet globally. It is the proprietary direct-to-sheet (DPET) technology, which eliminates several energy-intensive conversion steps, resulting in the lowest-cost method of producing PET sheet.

It serves a long-term customer base spread across the Americas, the Middle East and Europe, through a strategically focused logistics position in Oman.

The acquisition adds more than one million tons of installed capacity to Alpek, distributed among four sites:

• PET sheet: 400,000 tons (Salalah Free Zone, Oman).
• PET sheet recycling: 33,000 tons (Cincinnati, United States of America).
• PET Thermoformed Packaging: 11,000 tons (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia).
• PET resin: 576,000 tons (Salalah Free Zone, Oman).