Brazil stands out and should receive investments from the Rhodia Group
DCI
Brazil currently represents nearly 15% of the earnings of Rhodia in the world, and this percentage has been growing in these 90 years in which the French chemical company has been present in the country. Together with Asia, and specially China, the emerging markets amount to 45% of Rhodia's sales worldwide and they are the bet to recover the significant losses of 2009, as the result of global financial crisis.
Besides the latent market, Brazil is one of Rhodia's cradles of innovation, mainly in aspects of sustainability, and talent, since most of the multinational's executives have passed by the country.
Today, the International CEO of the company, Jean-Pierre Clamadieu, and the CEO of Rhodia América Latina, Marcos De Marchi, should announce the growth plans of the company for the coming years. In 2008, the sales of the company in the country amounted to US$ 1.2 billion.
Installed in 1919, Rhodia currently has five industrial plants in Brazil: two in Santo André, one in São Bernardo do Campo, one in Jacareí and one in Paulínia, all in the State of São Paulo. Paulínia is also one of the five international centers of research of the Rhodia Group.
With strong call for sustainable development, the company has been betting on this niche to increase and consolidate its operations. In the beginning of the month, it announced the launch of a glycerol-based solvent, a biodiesel co-product, for use in car paint and industrial paints. "The product, the manufacturing technology and the concept of the brand are 100% Brazilian. In other words, Rhodia shows once again its pioneering in the path towards making chemistry be in line with the concepts of sustainability", said Alexander Castanho, Director of the area of Solvents of Rhodia América Latina.