United Phosphorus buys DuPont’s Mancozeb fungicide business assets

United Phosphorus Limited (UPL), India's largest agro-chemical company said yesterday that it has acquired the global non-mixture mancozeb fungicide business and related assets from DuPont, a US-based chemical company for an undisclosed sum.

Included in the acquisition are the existing inventory, manufacturing and formulation production facilities in Barranquilla, Colombia of Delaware-based DuPont - the world's second-largest chemical after BASF in terms of market value.

Mumbai-based UPL will receive rights to the registered brands for non-mixture mancozeb products, as well as registrations and supporting regulatory data for those products, which include Manzate brand fungicides.

DuPont will continue to market and maintain registrations and trademarks for mancozeb mixtures such as DuPont Curzate M, Equation Contact and Mankocide fungicides.

UPL, which had sales of Rs647 crore for the financial year ended 31 March 2010, said that Mancozeb is a broad spectrum contact fungicide effective on a wide range of crops, and the this purchase will further strengthen UPL's position in the EBDC (ethylenebisdithiocarbamates) segment.

Under this agreement, UPL and its subsidiaries throughout the world can start selling Manzate and its formulations immediately.