BASF in Greater China
At a glance
BASF has been a committed partner to Greater China since 1885. With larger production sites in Shanghai, Nanjing, Chongqing, and Zhanjiang (under construction), BASF is a major foreign investor in the country’s chemical industry, and operates the Innovation Campus Shanghai, BASF’s largest R&D site in Asia. BASF posted sales of approximately €11.6 billion1 in 2022 to customers in Greater China and employed 11,411 people as of the end of the year. Greater China is currently BASF’s second largest market after the United States.
BASF currently operates 26 major wholly-owned subsidiaries, 10 major joint ventures, and maintains 23 sales offices in Greater China. BASF’s business in Greater China includes Petrochemicals, Intermediates, Performance Materials, Monomers, Dispersions & Resins, Performance Chemicals, Catalysts, Coatings, Care Chemicals, Nutrition and Health, and Agricultural Solutions.
These solutions are used in almost all areas of daily life such as in houses, cars, food, agriculture, pharmaceuticals, textiles, household goods, electronic equipment, and packaging. Over the past 20 years, BASF has invested more than €9 billion in Greater China (more than €13 billion with partners) to build a locally competitive production, marketing, sales, technical service and innovation network.
1Sales of BASF Group companies in the scope of consolidation, as of December 31, 2022. Sales of joint ventures and associated companies with BASF’s investment of between 20% and 50% in general which are consolidated at equity (e.g., BASF-YPC Company Limited) are not included.
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BASF major sites in Greater China
An integrated site with global, regional and local activities for research and development, production, sales and marketing, and functional units
- Location: Gaoqiao, Pudong, Shanghai
- Key milestones:
o Established in 1994
o Became a wholly-owned BASF entity in 2000
o Home to the BASF Greater China headquarters (legal entity since 2004; operations since 2012)
o Innovation Campus Shanghai established in 2012
o Operating nine production plants and a wastewater treatment plant by end of 2022
Products: Advanced materials including Ultramid® (polyamide, PA), Ultradur® (polybutylene terephthalate, PBT), polyurethane systems, Elastollan® (thermoplastics polyurethane elastomers, TPU) and Cellasto® (microcellular polyurethane), acrylic dispersions & copolymers colorants, detergent, metal complex dyes, leather auxiliaries, polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP), 3D printing materials and mobile emissions catalysts.
A major production site with one wholly-owned company and three joint ventures (JVs)
- Location: Shanghai Chemical Industry Park in Caojing, Shanghai
- Key milestones:
o Established in 2002 , first PolyTHF® production in 2005
o Operating 16 production plants as of the end of 2022
- Major companies:
o BASF Chemicals Co. Ltd. (wholly-owned)
o BASF Shanghai Coatings Co. Ltd. (JV with Shanghai Huayi Fine Chemical Co., Ltd)
o Shanghai Lianheng Isocyanate Co. Ltd. and Shanghai BASF Polyurethane Company Limited (two JVs with several partners)
- Products: PolyTHF® (polytetrahydrofuran), TDI (toluene diisocyanate), MDI (methylene diphenyl diisocyanate), Basonat® (polyisocyanate), precious metals-based salts and solutions, automotive coatings, resins and electrocoat, polyamide polymerization and process catalysts and antioxidants
A BASF wholly-owned production site for multiple products, including water-treatment monomers amine products and coating additives
- Location: Nanjing Jiangbei New Materials High-tech Park, Jiangsu
- Key milestones:
o Became BASF’s wholly-owned company in 2009, renamed as BASF Specialty Chemicals (Nanjing) Co. Ltd. in 2011
o Operating nine plants as of the end of 2022
- Products: AGEFLEX® FA1Q80MC, anionic flocculant, cationic flocculant, t-BA (tert-Butylamine), DMAPA(3-(dimethylamino) Propylamine), PEA (polyetheramine), N-otylamine A/P, 1,2-propylenediamine, additives for painting, ink, coating and adhesive
An integrated Verbund site jointly run by BASF and Sinopec (shareholding ratio: 50-50)
- Location: Nanjing Jiangbei New Materials High-tech Park, Jiangsu
- Key milestones:
o Established in 2000, commercial production since 2005
o Inauguration of its second phase in 2012
o Operating 33 production plants by end of 2022
Products: Low density polyethylene, ethylene-vinyl acetate, ethylene glycol, polystyrene, acrylic acid and acrylic esters, non-ionic surfactants, superabsorbent polymers, n-butanol, iso-butanol, 2-propyl-heptanol, butadiene, polyisobutylene, etc.
- 2022 key facts and figures:
o Total investment of $5.5 billion
o 2,113 employees
o Sales in 2022: around €3.6 billion
BASF wholly-owned production site for MDI (methylene diphenyl diisocyanate)
- Location: Changshou Economic & Technological Development Area, Chongqing
- Key milestones:
o First MDI production in 2015
o Completion of new steam methane reformer in 2018
- Product: MDI with annual capacity of 400,000 metric tons
Built and operated under the sole responsibility of BASF, upon completion, the site will be BASF’s largest single investment to date and ultimately BASF’s third-largest site worldwide (following Ludwigshafen, Germany, and Antwerp, Belgium)
- Location: Economic and Technological Development Zone, Zhanjiang, Guangdong province
- Key milestones:
o MoU signed in Berlin in July 2018
o Commencement of the project in November 2019
o Started piling of the first plants in May 2020
o Announced the inauguration of the first plant producing engineering plastics in September 2022
o The whole Verbund site is planned to be completed by 2030
- Investment: Up to €10 billion by 2030
- Plants and products:
o The BASF Zhanjiang Verbund site will be built in phases.
o The next phase on the core of Verbund, consisting of a steam cracker of ethylene and further downstream plants for intermediate chemicals, care chemicals, nutrition and health products, is expected to come on stream by 2025.
