Riyadh : Saudi Basic Industries Corp (SABIC) remains upbeat on a proposed petrochemical venture in the United States with ExxonMobil and a preliminary investment decision could be made within months, SABIC's chief executive said yesterday.
Last July SABIC, one of the world's largest petrochemicals groups, said it was studying whether to build a petrochemical complex on the US Gulf Coast with an Exxon affiliate. The project would supply ethylene to other units making derivatives.
SABIC chief executive Yousef Al Benyan told Reuters yesterday that he would travel to the United States at the end of this month to look at the proposed project.
"The outlook is still very positive...We will be working with ExxonMobil to come up with a very strong competitive structure of this project.
"We are very excited about current developments with Exxon Mobil, not only the cracker but also in the downstream type of projects we are going to do."
He added that SABIC would probably make an announcement about the ethylene project in the second quarter of this year, though this was not certain. SABIC is keen to invest abroad to diversify its risks and improve its access to foreign markets. Benyan said the company was looking to make other US investments worth between $2.5bn and $3bn.
"We think SABIC needs to strengthen its position in the US and leverage the current growth of demand for our commodity business."
