Akzo Nobel will form a new unit, Ink & Adhesive Resins, by merging the businesses Printing Ink Resins and Pine Specialties, with a combined total of 550 employees. The merger will be effective on January 1, 2004. The new sub business unit will be headquartered in Maastricht, the Netherlands, and will be part of Akzo Nobel's Pulp & Paper Chemicals business unit, headquartered in G¿teborg, Sweden. The new unit will operate dedicated production facilities in Maastricht (the Netherlands), Santo Varão (Portugal), Baxley, GA, Matteson, IL, Concordia (Argentina) and Mount Maunganui (New Zealand), and will have shared production sites in Bergen op Zoom (the Netherlands), Fengkai and Suzhou (PR China), Gunsan (Korea), Hallam (Australia), Jundiai (Brazil) and Toronto. The Ink Resins' product range includes modified rosin, alkyd, vehicles (varnishes), acrylic and toner resins for the graphic arts industry. The Adhesive Resins' product range includes rosin resins, resin dispersions, rosin soaps, and terpene derivatives for producers of adhesives, pigments, roadmarking, synthetic rubbers and aroma chemicals.

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