Lee Young-jun, president and group CEO of Lotte Chemical, met with institutional investors and presented a future vision to reorganize the business structure around basic chemicals and foster four new growth areas.
On the 17th, according to Lotte Chemical, Lee said at the "CEO Investor Meeting" held the previous day at the NH Finance Tower in Yeouido, Seoul, "We will shore up competitiveness in basic chemicals through proactive business restructuring and rationalization, and firmly build the 'four growth pillars' of advanced materials, fine chemicals, battery materials and hydrogen energy to complete a balanced portfolio."
Lee explained the status of petrochemical business restructuring underway in Daesan and Yeosu and expressed expectations for improvements in the financials and profit-and-loss structure of the basic chemicals institutional sector through it. The Daesan plant, the first case in Korea's petrochemical industry restructuring, is pushing for a merger with HD Hyundai Chemical, and the Yeosu business sites have submitted the final restructuring plan to the government and are awaiting approval.
Lotte Chemical plans to invest in high-value, high-growth businesses. In the advanced materials institutional sector, Lotte Engineering Plastics will begin operating the nation's largest compounding plant, with an annual capacity of 500,000 tons, from the second half of this year to supply customer-tailored materials. By advancing production, the company plans to expand its product lineup including Super Engineering Plastics (SuperEP) and broaden its business into future-growth high-tech industries such as physical artificial intelligence (AI) and aerospace.
The fine chemicals institutional sector plans to strengthen the high-value food and pharmaceutical materials and semiconductor chemicals businesses. For battery materials, the company aims to boost competitiveness by focusing on high-value product lines such as circuit foil for artificial intelligence (AI) and high-end battery foil.
In the hydrogen energy business, the joint venture Lotte SK Eneroot plans to move to preempt the domestic market based on Ulsan Hydrogen Power No. 1, its second hydrogen fuel cell power plant, and the Daesan hydrogen shipment center, which has been in operation since Nov. last year.