Brookfield Engineering Laboratories, Middleboro, MA, announced the opening of a sales and support office in the Chicago area. The sales office will primarily handle accounts in Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin and neighboring states, the company said. Brookfield is supplier of viscosity-measurement and control instruments.

Degussa AG, Dusseldorf, Germany, announced plans to build a new manufacturing site encompassing several key industrial segments on the southern edge of Shanghai, China, including a Coatings and Colorants polyester-resin facility scheduled to begin operation in early 2006. Degussa announced the signing of a strategic cooperation agreement with Shanghai Chemical Industry Park to develop the site. Degussa Management Board Chairman Utz-Hellmuth Felcht called plans for the complex "an important step in expanding our China commitment. With the new multi-user site we are creating an expandable platform for establishing our business units' production facilities in the future." Degussa recently opened a new research and development center in Shanghai as part of its expansion program for China. The company currently operates 17 companies in China, including a number of joint-venture businesses.

Degussa said its Advanced Fillers & Pigments Business Unit will boost capacity at the business's Chester, PA, precipitated performance silica production site by "several million pounds" by means of debottlenecking and other actions involving existing equipment and technology. Initial capacity-expansion moves are scheduled for completion by the end of this year, said Thomas Trempler, vice president and general manager for the business unit in the NAFTA region. The unit operates 29 plants in 18 countries and produces carbon black, performance silica, matting agents and iron blue pigments.

Kerr-McGee Chemical L.L.C., Oklahoma City, in a upgrade to the company's titanium dioxide (TiO2) production site in Uerdingen, Germany, started operation of a new ore mill to process titanium-bearing ore. The mill is expected to eventually replace three older mills at the site, the company said. Peter Davies, director of European operations for Kerr-McGee Chemical, said the investment "demonstrates Kerr-McGee's commitment to the future of the Uerdingen pigment operations."

Rust-Oleum Corp., Vernon Hills, IL, said a federal District Court in San Francisco ruled in favor of Martin Mathys S.A. and Rust-Oleum, Martin Mathys' exclusive U.S. distributor, in a trademark infringement and unfair-competition lawsuit against Maintenance Repair Technology Co. Rust-Oleum said Maintenance Repair Technology Co., doing business under the names ACT-Martco and Advanced Coating Technology, used the Martin Mathys brand name NOXYDE for a paint product used on the new Carquinez Bridge in California. The court awarded Martin Mathys and Rust-Oleum $300,000 in damages, plus attorneys' fees, and issued an injunction barring ACT from using the NOXYDE brand name.

Wacker Polymer Systems, Adrian, MI, has appointed Fitz Chem Corp., Itasca, IL, to an expanded distribution territory that includes Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska and all of Illinois. Fitz Chem's existing distribution territory for Wacker includes northern Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wisconsin.