LEVERKUSEN, Germany (Reuters) – Bayer (BAYGn.DE: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) suggested there was room to lift prices at its high-tech plastics and chemicals business this year to counter soaring raw material costs that squeezed first quarter margins.

The diversified healthcare group’s MaterialScience division, global market leader in polycarbonate plastics used in blu-ray discs and car lights, lowered its outlook last month as a result of the soaring costs of petrochemicals such as benzene.

FRANKFURT, May 3 (Reuters) – Eli Lilly, the world’s
fourth-largest diabetes drugs maker, aims to have the widest
range of anti diabetic drugs in order to win a larger slice in
the growing market.

The global $40 billion diabetes drugs market could be worth
as much as $53 billion in 2016, making it the second-largest
therapeutic area by sales in the pharmaceuticals industry after
cancer, according to market research IMS.

FRANKFURT, May 2 (Reuters) – Finnish chemicals group Kemira
believes stricter environmental regulation of its
customers in the oil and gas industry will create a big new
market for its water treatment chemicals, its chief executive
told Reuters.

Kemira, one of the world’s largest makers of chemicals for
the paper industry, is a relatively small supplier of chemicals
for fossil fuels extraction and mining, competing with BASF
, Clariant and SNF Flomin Inc.

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Germany’s Bayer AG (BAYGn.DE: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) has agreed to buy U.S. contraceptive devices maker Conceptus (CPTS.O: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) for $1.1 billion, aiming to underpin its position as the world’s largest women’s healthcare provider,

Bayer, whose shares were down 2.3 percent by 0823 GMT, will launch a public tender offer to acquire all Conceptus shares for $31.00 each in cash, in an offer agreed with Conceptus’s management, Bayer said on Monday.

MANNHEIM, Germany, April 26 (Reuters) – BASF
became the latest chemicals company to get a boost from
pesticides, helping it to a bigger-than-expected gain in
quarterly operating income.

The German group, the world’s largest chemicals company by
sales, said on Friday that first-quarter earnings before
interest and tax (EBIT), adjusted for one-off items, rose 10.1
percent to 2.21 billion euros ($2.88 billion), beating the 2.14
billion euro average estimate in a Reuters poll of analysts.

WIESBADEN, Germany, April 25 (Reuters) – Germany’s SGL
Carbon, a key supplier to the scrap-to-steel industry,
is on the lookout for joint venture partners in China as the
world’s largest steel producing nation begins to embrace metal
recycling.

“A joint venture appears to be the best option. We could
contribute years of market knowledge and technological know-how
in particular,” said SGL Chief Executive Robert Koehler.

FRANKFURT, March 27 (Reuters) – Europe’s biggest insurer
Allianz has secured the top spot in Turkey’s
fast-growing insurance market by agreeing to buy Yapi Kredi
Sigorta for about 1.6 billion Turkish lira ($883
million).

The German group said on Wednesday it was buying a 93.9
percent stake in the Turkish insurer from local lender Yapi
Kredi Bank. After closure of that deal, it will make
a mandatory tender offer for the remaining 6.1 percent stake.

FRANKFURT, March 21 (Reuters) – Lanxess AG, the
world’s largest synthetic-rubber maker, has warned of a sharp
drop in earnings in the first quarter, joining the list of auto
suppliers to take a hit from anaemic European car markets.

Shares in the German company tumbled more than 7 percent,
hitting their lowest in seven months and underperforming a 1.4
percent decline in the STOXX Europe 600 chemicals index.

OBERURSAL, Germany (Reuters) – A new German party that considers the euro a “fatal mistake” made its public debut on Monday, buoyed by an opinion poll suggesting one in four Germans shares its concerns, but its prospects in September’s national election remain dim.

The ‘Alternative for Germany’ (AfD), which wants to return to the Deutschmark, hopes to tap a vein of public anxiety over the costs of the euro zone crisis, though all mainstream German parties remain solidly in favour of the common currency.

DARMSTADT, Germany, March 7 (Reuters) – Germany’s Merck KGaA
is predicting strong growth in earnings this year and
next as cost cuts and Chinese demand for liquid crystals used in
televisions outweigh recent setbacks in its drugs business.

Shares in the world’s largest maker of liquid crystals for
flat panel TV displays jumped as much as 5.3 percent to a record
high on Thursday, after the family-controlled company beat
fourth-quarter profit expectations.