Other industrial sectors such as automotive, aerospace, food, cosmetics, agriculture, manufacturing, and textiles are highly dependent on such products.
Specialty chemicals are used in a wide array of industries, including automotive, aerospace, agriculture, construction, electronics, food and beverage, personal care, pharmaceutical, and textile.
[4] A batch process is one in which a defined quantity of product is made from a fixed input of raw materials during a measured period of time.
The batch process most often consists of introducing accurately measured amounts of starting materials into a vessel followed by a series of processes involving mixing, heating, cooling, making more chemical reactions, distillation, crystallization, separation, drying, packaging etc., taking place at predetermined and scheduled intervals.
The manufacturing processes are supported by activities such as the quality testing, storage, warehousing, logistics of the products, and management by recycling, treatment and disposal of by-products, and waste streams.
This has given rise to a wide range of business needs and opportunities, consequently there are a large number of speciality chemical companies around the world.
The common stock of over 400 speciality chemical companies from around the world are identified by Bloomberg,[7] providers of global business and financial information.
In 2010, the 10 largest European speciality chemical companies were BASF, AkzoNobel, Clariant, Evonik, Cognis, Kemira, Lanxess, Rhodia, Wacker and Croda.
The products include dyestuffs, paints, explosives, adhesives, flavors and fragrances, photographic chemicals, unrecorded media and various industrial specialities.