Koch, Inc. (/koʊk/ KOHK) is an American multinational conglomerate corporation based in Wichita, Kansas, and is the second-largest privately held company in the United States, after Cargill.

[6][5][9] The company was founded by its namesake, Fred C. Koch, in 1940 after he developed an innovative crude oil refining process.

[16][17] In his 1960 book, A Business Man Looks at Communism, Koch wrote that he found the USSR to be "a land of hunger, misery, and terror.

[23] It was also one of the few refineries capable of refining fuel for airplanes, and was later a strategic bombing target for Allied forces when World War II broke out.

[27][28] At that time, it was primarily an engineering firm with a 35% interest in Great Northern Oil Company, which owned the Pine Bend Refinery in Minnesota, a crude oil-gathering system in Oklahoma,[16] and some cattle ranches.

[31][32] The Pine Bend Refinery produced chemicals, fibers, polymers, asphalt and other commodities such as petroleum coke and sulfur.

In June 1985, William and Frederick sued their brothers claiming that they were underpaid for their stakes, but the suit was dismissed for lack of merit.

[38][39][40][41] In 2008, the company discovered that the French affiliate Koch-Glitsch had violated bribery laws allegedly securing contracts in Algeria, Egypt, India, Morocco, Nigeria and Saudi Arabia after an investigation by Ethics Compliance officer, Egorova-Farines.

According to journalist Jennifer Rubin, Koch Industries' general counsel stated that Egorova-Farines failed to promptly share the findings, choosing instead to give the information to a manager at Koch-Glitsch who was later fired for bribery.

According to Koch Industries' general counsel, "Egorova-Farines was not fired but instead ran into performance problems, left the company to go on leave and never returned."

Egorova-Farines sued Koch-Glitsch for wrongful termination in France, lost, and "was ordered to pay costs for bringing a frivolous case".

[43] In 2010, the company was among the first group of nearly 2,000 employers that applied for and were granted federal reimbursements from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, under the new Early Retiree Reinsurance Program established by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, for providing health insurance to retirees too young to be eligible for Medicare.

[45] In September 2014, along with the private equity arm of Goldman Sachs, the company acquired Flint Group, a printing ink producer, for $3 billion.

[51] In 2015, the company joined the "Ban the Box" movement by removing questions about prior criminal convictions from its job application, making it easier for ex-offenders to find work.

[64][65] Arteva Europe is an "internal bank" which is headquartered in Luxembourg and manages the European cash flows of Koch Industries.

[66] Flint Hills Resources LP, originally called Koch Petroleum Group, is a refining and chemicals company based in Wichita, Kansas.

It sells gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, ethanol, polymers, intermediate chemicals, base oils and asphalt.

It handles one quarter of all Canadian oil sands crude entering the U.S.[68] It also operates 4 fuel terminals in Wisconsin, 6 in Texas, and one each in Iowa and Minnesota.

[70] On July 16, 2014, Flint Hills Resources acquired PetroLogistics, a Houston-based manufacturer of chemical and polymer grade propylene.

GP manufactures a wide variety of household products under the brand names Brawny, Angel Soft, Mardi Gras, Quilted Northern, Dixie, Sparkle, and Vanity Fair.

The company employs more than 18,000 people and has present activities in North and South America, Europe, Asia, Africa and the Middle East.

[118] In 2006, a Flint Hills Resources refinery in North Pole, Alaska[119] was fined $16,000 by the EPA for 10 separate violations and was required to spend another $60,000 on safety equipment.

According to OpenSecrets, many of Koch, Inc.'s contributions have gone toward achieving legislation on taxes, energy and nuclear power, defense appropriations and financial regulatory reform.

[125] Koch Industries has been criticized by the environmentalist group Greenpeace for the role the company played in affecting climate change policy in the United States.

[128] The company has opposed the regulation of financial derivatives, limits on greenhouse gases,[42] and sponsors free market foundations and causes.

[131] According to Koch, Inc., "LCFS would cripple refiners that rely on heavy crude feedstocks to provide the transportation fuels that keep America moving.

According to the watchdog group Documented, in 2020 Koch, Inc. contributed $375,000 to the Rule of Law Defense Fund, a fund-raising arm of the Republican Attorneys General Association.