• China to become AkzoNobel's biggest market
• Swedish firms to gain from China’s new model

Swedish-Dutch paint and chemicals company AkzoNobel keeps accelerating on emerging markets as demand in Europe and the US remain slow.

Three month ago AkzoNobel, with roots going back all the way to Swedish chemist and innovator Alfred Nobel, opened a 375 million dollar production facility in China; the company’s single biggest greenfield investment ever.

Now the world’s largest paintmaker plans to invest 90 million euros ($122 million) in Brazil in a new plant to supply chemicals to a giant pulp mill. The deal with Eldorado Celulose e Papel is part of a move to double sales in the country to 1.5 billion euros.

“This 15-year agreement confirms our intention to accelerate growth and expand our activities in the world’s high growth regions,” said Rob Frohn, the AkzoNobel Board member responsible for Specialty Chemicals.

“We are about to make one of the biggest investments in our history, which emphasizes both the importance of Latin America to our growth ambitions and our commitment to the pulp and paper industry.”

China is likely to overtake the US as Akso Nobel’s biggest market within five years, Hans Wijers, chief executive of AkzoNobel, told The Swedish Wire in Shanghai in November.

“We have aggressive growth plans”, he said in an interview. “We have grown double-digit the last couple of years and intend to continue doing so. We are actively looking to gain market shares in China”.

The company’s emerging-market strategy, outlined last year, includes doubling revenue from China to 3 billion dollar and quadrupling sales from India to 1 billion euros in five years.

AkzoNobel said its third quarter profits rose 21 percent due to cost-cutting and growth in emerging markets, adding its cautious over housing and construction in mature markets. Growth in emerging market is therefore significantly more important. High-growth markets will move from 37 percent of revenue today to 50 percent in this decade, the company said.