Rockwood Holdings Inc

Rockwood Holdings Inc was incorporated in Delaware in September 2000. It is a developer, manufacturer and marketer of value-added specialty chemicals and materials used for industrial and commercial purposes. The Company operates through two business segments: Lithium and Surface Treatment. The Lithium segment operates under the Rockwood Lithium brand name and develops lithium chemicals for industries and end markets. It develops and manufactures basic lithium compounds, including lithium carbonate, lithium hydroxide, lithium chloride, and value-added lithium specialties and reagents, including butyllithium and lithium aluminum hydride. It operates lithium business along the following five business divisions reflecting its core end-markets: Lithium Salts; Special Salts; Butyllithium/Lithium Metal; Battery Products and Lithium Specialties. Lithium segment obtains lithium brine which it uses to produce lithium products through evaporation in the Salar de Atacama, Chile and Silver Peak, Nevada. Lithium's customers include Bayer CropScience (a division of Bayer AG), Syngenta AG, Umicore S.A., Samsung SDI Co. Ltd. and Royal DSM N.V. Surface Treatment segment operates under the Chemetall brand name and develops and manufactures metal surface treatment products and services for industries and end market. Surface Treatment's products are used for a variety of applications and serve the automotive, aerospace and general industrial markets, including steel and metal-working industries. The customers include ArcelorMittal, Daimler AG, European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company (EADS) N.V., Ford, Renault-Nissan and Volkswagen AG. The competitors in this segment includes: Dow Corning Corporation, Catalise Industria e Comercio de Metals Ltda and Nachmann S.r.I. The Company's operations are subject to regulation by the FDA with respect to certain products produced, marketed and sold by its Lithium segment, which includes pharmaceutical intermediates.