Indorama Exits Czech rPET Joint Venture

According to CPRJ on January 26th, Indorama Ventures has sold its 85% stake in Czech-based UCY Polymer to minority shareholder Maximilian Josef Söllner, with the transaction completed through his affiliated company UCY Global Invest. The equity transfer was for zero consideration.

Established in 2022, the joint venture was formed when the Thai chemical group acquired a majority stake in UCY, aiming to expand its recycled PET (rPET) recycling capacity by leveraging waste bottle materials collected through the German Deposit Refund Scheme (DRS).

"Our core business assumption – the continuous procurement of high-quality German raw materials – became unfeasible due to regulatory changes and shifts in the operating models of two major German suppliers," Indorama Ventures stated. "Consequently, UCY was forced to switch to raw materials from the Czech Republic or neighboring markets, but its internal technology was not designed for these types of materials, ultimately leading to substandard product output that failed to meet quality requirements. We reassessed the investment in production line upgrades and other alternatives, and ultimately determined that they were not economically viable."

At the time of Silvergate Rama Group's investment, UCY Polymer had already built a 40,000-ton annual capacity rPET flake production line, with post-consumer containers as raw materials, processed through sorting, crushing, and washing processes.