SAFC Hitech(R) Appoints Philip Rose as New President; Sees Great Opportunity in Electronics Industry

ST. LOUIS, April 21 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- SAFC Hitech®, a business segment within SAFC®, a member of the Sigma-Aldrich® Group (Nasdaq: SIAL), today announced the appointment of Philip Rose as its new company president succeeding Barry Leese, who retired on April 1, 2010. Rose will be based at SAFC Hitech's Haverhill, MA, facility, and joins the company after 20 years with Rohm & Haas (recently acquired by Dow Chemical in 2009), where he worked in a variety of senior roles in R&D, Marketing, Operations and Business Development in the United States, South Korea and Japan.

Philip Rose was most recently based in Seoul, Korea, where he served as the global marketing director for Dow Electronic Materials' display technologies unit.  Looking at the challenges ahead in his new role, Rose sees a great deal of opportunity. "SAFC Hitech has established itself as a leading materials supplier in the electronics industry," he said.  "Despite generally slow conditions in the global economy in 2009, the business performed well in the final quarter of the year, and the longer-term outlook remains positive. Our goal is to continue to develop the chemistries, the expertise, the tools and methodologies that will facilitate future generations of electronics.  The foundation is in place for us to continue to grow our leading portfolio of materials and services that enable our customers' technological advances."

Barry Leese caps an illustrious career, the last 27 years of which he spent leading Epichem and SAFC Hitech. Leese helped Epichem to become the leading provider of metal organics, precursors and gases to the electronics industries. The business was acquired by Sigma-Aldrich in early 2007 and integrated in its SAFC Hitech operations, of which Leese was named president.

"As president of SAFC Hitech, Barry Leese was instrumental in supporting and enabling the seamless integration of the former Epichem business into the Hitech business segment," said SAFC president Gilles Cottier.  "His experience during the transition proved invaluable, and we thank him for all the hard work and expert advice."  

For further information regarding SAFC Hitech's world-class portfolio of products and services, visit www.safchitech.com.

Cautionary statement: The foregoing release contains forward-looking statements that can be identified by terminology such as "sees a great deal of opportunity," "the longer-term outlook remains positive," "will facilitate future generations of electronics," "continue to grow our leading portfolio" or similar expressions, or by express or implied discussions regarding potential future revenues from products derived therefrom. You should not place undue reliance on these statements. Such forward-looking statements reflect the current views of management regarding future events, and involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such statements. There can be no guarantee that SAFC Hitech will continue to meet the demands of the marketplace. Nor can there be any guarantee that SAFC Hitech will achieve any particular levels of revenue in the future. In particular, management's expectations regarding SAFC Hitech could be affected by, among other things, unexpected regulatory actions or delays or government regulation generally; the Company's ability to obtain or maintain patent or other proprietary intellectual property protection; competition in general; government, industry and general public pricing pressures; the impact that the foregoing factors could have on the values attributed to the Company's assets and liabilities as recorded in its consolidated balance sheet, and other risks and factors referred to in Sigma-Aldrich's current Form 10-K on file with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or should underlying assumptions prove incorrect, actual results may vary materially from those anticipated, believed, estimated or expected. Sigma-Aldrich is providing the information in this press release as of this date and does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements contained in this press release as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

About SAFC Hitech: SAFC Hitech provides a unique chemistry service translating application understanding into performance materials worldwide. Through collaborative partnerships and an integrated approach from research and development, process development and scale up to commercial manufacturing, SAFC Hitech invests in innovation and manufacturing enabling current and future technology needs. Further information can be found at http://www.safchitech.com.

About SAFC: SAFC is the custom manufacturing and services business unit within Sigma-Aldrich that focuses on high-purity inorganics for high technology applications, cell culture products and services for biopharmaceutical manufacturing, biochemical production and the manufacturing of complex, multi-step organic synthesis of APIs and key intermediates. SAFC has manufacturing facilities around the world dedicated to providing manufacturing services for companies requiring a reliable partner to produce their custom manufactured materials. SAFC has four business segments – SAFC Pharma®, SAFC Supply Solutions®, SAFC Biosciences®, and SAFC Hitech® – and had annual sales of over $600 million in 2009. SAFC is considered a top 10 fine chemical company. For more information about SAFC, visit www.safcglobal.com.

About Sigma-Aldrich: Sigma-Aldrich is a leading Life Science and High Technology company. Its biochemical and organic chemical products and kits are used in scientific research, including genomic and proteomic research, biotechnology, pharmaceutical development and as key components in pharmaceutical, diagnostic and other high technology manufacturing. The company has customers in life science companies, university and government institutions, hospitals, and in industry. Over one million scientists and technologists use its products. Sigma-Aldrich operates in 38 countries and has 7,700 employees providing excellent service worldwide. Sigma-Aldrich is committed to Accelerating Customer Success through Innovation and Leadership in Life Science, High Technology and Service. For more information about Sigma-Aldrich, please visit its award-winning Web site at www.sigma-aldrich.com.

SAFC, SAFC Hitech and Sigma-Aldrich are registered trademarks Sigma-Aldrich Biotechnology L.P. and Sigma-Aldrich Co.

SOURCE Sigma-Aldrich