OMG sells its precious metals group to Umicore

9 August 2003

Cleveland, OH-based OM Group, Inc. (OMG) announced that it has completed the sale of its Precious Metals Group (PMG) to Umicore for €697 million, or US$814 million. OMG will use net proceeds of approximately $730 million to reduce debt. Umicore is a global, Brussels, Belgium-based metals and materials group.

The PMG business sold to Umicore—which includes the OMG autocatalyst group—was acquired by OMG from Degussa in August 2001. At that time the group was known as dmc2.

The PMG is a global producer of autocatalysts, with operations in Europe, North and South America, Asia and Africa. In North America, the group is involved in ICT Inc., a joint venture with Nippon Shokubai of Japan. PMG is also active in precious metals refining, recycling and marketing, serving the electronics, jewelry, glass and pharmaceutical industries. It has also made investments in fuel cell technology.

PMG has approximately 3500 employees. It had annual sales of approximately €4.6 billion, or approximately €550 million excluding the value of contained precious metals.

Source: OMG, Umicore