Recovery signs at PolyOne elastomers unit

By Patrick Raleigh ERJ On-line news editor

Cleveland, Ohio-PolyOne Corp.'s 'for sale' Elastomers & Performance Additives has posted a 1-percent increase in first quarter sales to $95 million, including a 16-percent rise in volumes. The unit's profitability after special items also increased “on higher shipments to automotive accounts,” the company said 28 April.

Including one-off charges, PolyOne Elastomers & Performance Additives' first quarter earnings came in at $7.8 million-5 percent lower than the same period last year. PolyOne listed charges totalling $5.5 million for the closure of two Elastomers & Performance Additives plants and an Engineered Films' facility, in the first quarter of 2004.

Last year, PolyOne announced plans to divest its Elastomers & Performance Additives, Specialty Resins and Engineered Films businesses. “We expect to sell these three business operations in 2004,” said the company's latest statement.

For the second quarter, PolyOne said the three units “should realise the benefit of lower costs from the plant closings completed earlier this year. The net result is that the discontinued businesses should contribute improved net income of $1 million to $2 million compared with the first quarter of 2004.”

PolyOne Elastomers & Performance Additives' supplies thermoset elastomer and rubber compounds based on a wide range of materials from natural rubber to fluoroelastomers.

It also supplies thermoset polyurethane compounds for foamed and non-foamed castable products used in applications such as automotive, carpeting, furniture and healthcare.

The unit's additives portfolio includes accelerators, fillers, vulcanisation agents and tackifiers, as well as colorants and speciality additives for latexes, plastisols, polyurethanes and epoxies.