The Chinese group Nine Dragons Paper www.ndpaper.com plans to purchase the United States activity of Catalyst Paper www.catalystpaper.com, Canadian manufacturer of paper and cellulose. The two companies have announced that they have entered into an agreement on the basis that Nine Dragons will take over all the shareholding in Catalyst Paper Operations Inc. which has two installations in Rumford in Maine and Biron in Wisconsin, both in the United States. The price of the transaction has been fixed at 175 million dollars. Both the Rumford and the Biron sites are fully integrated paper mills which operate in the manufacturing and distribution sector of various types of materials for paper packaging. The Rumford factory manages three machines for manufacturing paper with a combined capacity of about 550 thousand tons of uncoated and coated paper. The factory also has the capacity to produce 520 thousand tons of hardwood pulp, of which 400 thousand tons are destined for internal use.
The Biron site manages two paper machines with a combined capacity of about 340 thousand tons of coated mechanical paper.