Israel Chemicals Ltd. (NYSE: ICL; TASE: ICL) is to invest $452 million for 50% ownership of a joint venture that will operate a fully integrated, phosphate business in China. Israel Chemicals will also take a 15% strategic holding in Yunnan Yuntianhua, one of Asia's leading producers of phosphate rock, which is traded on the Shanghai stock exchange with a market cap of $1.8 billion.
The joint venture will include a mine that produces 2.5 million tons of phosphate rock annually for the next 30 years, a downstream phosphate operation and a marketing and sales organization that primarily serves the Chinese and the Asian markets.
Israel Chemicals says that the strategic alliance will leverage its and Yunnan Yuntianhua's technical, marketing and production expertise and will include a joint phosphate R&D platform in the Yunnan province to develop process improvement and new products for both partners.
Israel Chemicals says that it has identified significant expansion and synergy potential and the major thrust of the joint venture's strategy will be its transformation from a commodity fertilizer company to a specialty player in agriculture, food Ingredients and engineered materials.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on December 16, 2014
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