Mitsubishi Chemical Corp. of Tokyo plans to build an engineering plastics compounding plant in China's Guangdong province to meet demand in the growing automotive market there.
The 30 million-pound-capacity plant is to begin operating in February 2008, according to Japanese press reports. Mitsubishi Engineering Plastics Corp. plans to invest 800 million yen ($6.8 million.)
Southern China is attracting significant investment from Japanese carmakers. Honda Motor Co. last month opened its second plant in Guangdong.
Mitsubishi in April said it was considering building a polycarbonate/bisphenol A plant in Beijing, in a joint venture with China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., or Sinopec.
That $190 million venture, slated to be completed in 2008, will have capacity for 132 million pounds of PC and 220 million pounds of BPA a year. At the time it also said it was expanding PC production in Japan with a 132 million-pound plant in Kurosaki.