May 1, 2012 – Arsenal Capital Partners announced today the acquisitions of Plasticolors, Inc. and Evonik Industries’ Colortrend global colorants business. The firm will combine these two businesses under a new platform company, Chromaflo Technologies, which will be headquartered in Ashtabula, OH.
“Because of Arsenal’s deep expertise in the specialty chemicals sector we were able to complete this innovative transaction and create Chromaflo Technologies,” said John Televantos, a Partner at Arsenal and Co-Head of the firm’s Specialty Industrials Group. “With this merger we have created a company with the scale and range of product technologies that has the immediate critical mass to be a leading global player in the pigments dispersion market.”
“We partnered with the Plasticolors’ team led by CEO Scott Becker to bring together these two complementary players in the colorants industry,” said Timothy Zappala, a Partner at Arsenal and Co-Head of the firm’s Specialty Industrials Group. “Colortrend provides color systems to the architectural and industrial coatings markets while Plasticolors is the leading provider of custom pigment solutions to thermoset plastics and industrial coatings markets. The combination creates a leading independent global pigment dispersion platform positioning the new company to address the increasingly complex customer technical requirements in a multitude of applications and end markets.”
Plasticolors is a supplier of pigment and chemical dispersions to the thermoset composites and industrial paint and coatings industries. The company’s colorants can be found in a variety of products including industrial coatings, interior and exterior automotive components, epoxy flooring, electrical and appliance housings and other paints, coatings, and molded composite applications. The company was founded in 1970 and is based in Ashtabula, OH (www.plasticolors.com).
Evonik’s colorants business develops, produces and markets the COLORTREND brand of paints for decorative end-use applications in the architecture sector. Its CHROMA-CHEM products are used for industrial applications including maintenance and marine and timber coatings. In 2011 Evonik’s colorants business generated sales of around €130 million, with roughly half of this amount coming from the USA. In addition to a facility in Lockland, OH, there are production plants in Maastricht (Netherlands), Dandenong (Australia) and Brampton (Canada) operating with over 300 employees. In fiscal 2010 the company had sales of around €13.3 billion and an operating profit (EBITDA) of about €2.4 billion. The company is based in Essen, Germany (www.evonik.com).
