AMPAC Fine Chemicals expands capabilities with Texas plant

In support of its strategy of positioning for future growth, American Pacific Corporation announced April 12 that its subsidiary, AMPAC Fine Chemicals, has expanded its California-based pharmaceutical chemicals business into LaPorte, Texas. The LaPorte plant is a multi-purpose manufacturing facility specializing in the production of registered intermediates and active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) for the pharmaceutical industry. The plant is well known for its expertise in performing energetic chemistry at large scale and has been successfully inspected by the Food and Drug Administration – most recently in 2008. With state-of-the-art equipment, these cGMP manufacturing facilities were completed in 2001 with significant new equipment added in the last four years. The addition of these facilities increases AMPAC Fine Chemicals' total reactor capacity by approximately 30 percent. The LaPorte facilities were purchased by American Pacific Corporation on April 9, 2010 for $475 thousand plus other direct costs.

"With the addition of these facilities, we continue to move toward our vision of creating value-added growth in cGMP pharmaceutical chemical manufacturing," stated Aslam Malik, president of AMPAC Fine Chemicals. "This additional capability in Texas, which includes commercial scale hydrogenation, as well as azide, cyanide, and phosgene capabilities, fits well with our areas of established expertise in Energetic Chemistry and Continuous Processing. While it will take some time to fill this expanded capacity, our pipeline remains strong and we foresee the need for this capacity as our development products mature."

"Building new capacity to accommodate future growth just did not make sense to us with excellent facilities sitting relatively idle and available on attractive terms," said Joe Carleone, CEO of American Pacific Corporation. "We are convinced that the pharmaceutical companies will continue to grow their outsourcing strategy for chemicals, especially when unique technologies are involved; as the industry rebounds, we will be there to serve our customers' increasing needs."

LaPorte is in the heart of the chemical industry in the Houston area, giving AMPAC Fine Chemicals access to some of the best infrastructure and personnel resources in the world.