According to statistics, there are 17 chemical companies among the top 500 companies in the world. The top ones are DuPont of the United States, BASF of Germany, Hoechst and Bayer, Dow Company of the United States and Ciba of Switzerland. —Geigy Corporation, etc. They all have a history of more than a hundred years. They vigorously developed petrochemical industry before the 1970s, and then gradually turned to fine chemicals. Germany is the earliest country to develop fine chemicals. They started from coal chemical industry. Before the 1950s, about 80% of them used coal chemical industry as raw materials. However, due to the poor process route and poor efficiency of coal chemical industry, the proportion of chemical products using petroleum as raw material soared to 80% since 1970. above.
DuPont is the world's largest chemical company, founded in 1802. It only started to shift from petrochemical industry to fine chemical industry in a major way around 1980. It started later than Germany and Japan, but it developed very quickly. The company aimed to improve the quality, reduce costs and improve market competitiveness of its previous general-purpose products. Since the 1980s, it has expanded the production of specialty chemicals, mainly for the production of fine chemical products such as pesticides, medicines, special polymers, and composite materials. . The company's long-term goal is to develop life science products, including health care products, anti-cancer, anti-aging and other drugs and bionic medical products. In 1995, the company's profit was US$3.3 billion.
Dow Chemical Company was founded in 1897. In the late 1970s, through product structure adjustment, the company strengthened its production of pharmaceutical and various engineering polymers, especially its expertise in automotive coatings and adhesives. The company's output value of fine chemicals was only US$540 million in 1973, with a fine chemicals ratio of 18, which surged to 50 in 1996. In the early 1990s, the total output value was US$20 billion, and the output value of fine chemicals accounted for US$11 billion.
BASF, Hoechst and Bayer are the three pillars of German chemical companies. They mostly use mergers, transfers, and sales as means to increase investment, use their technical strength to implement core businesses, and try to increase the proportion of core businesses and the market share of leading products. Focus on the development of high-tech fields such as health care medical supplies, agricultural chemicals, electronic chemicals, medical diagnostic supplies, information imaging supplies, aerospace chemicals and new materials, greatly improving the technological content and economic benefits of fine chemical products. For example, the sales of several distinctive products such as BASF's coatings and photosensitive resins accounted for 30% of total sales in 1995 from 11% in 1980. The company's turnover in 1994 was Mark 46.2 billion, Hoechst's turnover in 1996 was Mark 52.1 billion, and Bayer's turnover in 1994 was US$26.7 billion. They all attach great importance to the development of high-tech. By the end of 1995, Bayer had obtained 155,000 patents and 24,000 products. Its leading product in medicine, aspirin, has a history of a century.
The Swiss Ciba-Geigy Company is a world-famous manufacturer of pesticides, medicines, dyes, additives, cosmetics, detergents, aerospace adhesives, etc. It is the only company in the world that develops all outsourced raw materials. A large company in fine chemicals. In 1994, its turnover was US$16.1 billion, and its fine chemicals rate ranked first in the world, reaching over 80%.
Developed countries are constantly adjusting the product structure of the chemical industry based on the needs of economic benefits and development, as well as the guidance of the market, environment and resources. The focus of their transition is on fine chemicals and the development of fine chemicals. has become a worldwide trend. In 1991, the sales of fine chemicals in the world were more than 40 billion US dollars, mainly in Western Europe, the United States and Japan. In the early 1990s, the fine chemical industry rate in developed countries was about 55, while it rose to 60 in the late 1990s. The development speed of fine chemicals has always been higher than that of other industries. Taking the United States as an example, in the late 1980s, the industrial growth rate was 2.9, while the fine chemical industry was as high as 5. Their main development goal is to expand the production of special products, such as medical and health products, electronic chemicals, special polymers and composite materials, and vigorously develop related life science products, such as anti-cancer drugs, bionic medical products, pollution-free and efficient weeding agents, fungicides, etc.
Since our country identified fine chemicals as a key development goal in the 1980s, it has given policy preference and has developed relatively rapidly. During the "Eighth Five-Year Plan" period, 10 fine chemical technology development centers have been built, with an annual production capacity of more than 8 million tons, about 10,000 product varieties, and an annual output value of 90 billion yuan, which has laid a certain foundation. At the end of the 20th century, the rate of fine chemicals reached 35. This is a big gap compared with developed countries abroad. For the electronics industry alone, they need 16,000 kinds of fine chemicals and more than 7,000 kinds of color TVs. The matching ratio of domestic products is less than 20%, and the rest are imported. Others are in greater shortage in fabric finishing agents, leather finishing agents, etc. In addition, judging from the quality, variety, technical level, equipment and experience of my country's fine chemical products, they cannot meet the needs of many industries.
Every year, the fine chemical industry will have weak and peak seasons. Before my country entered the WTO, March to May and August to November were the peak seasons, December to February were slightly lighter, and June to July were very poor. Now it mainly depends on the situation of the international chemical industry, but generally speaking, the fluctuations are not big, and generally follow the oil price. It also depends on the situation of the textile industry.