Shin-Etsu Chemical Co., Ltd. (Head Office: Tokyo, President: Yasuhiko Saito) plans to make investments to strengthen the pharmaceutical cellulose business.

These investments will be implemented in the Naoetsu plant (Joetsu-city, Niigata Pref.). The plan is to double the manufacturing capacity of pharmaceutical excipient “Shin-Etsu AQOAT” (Hypromellose Acetate Succinate) with a completion time of Q2, 2026. The estimated investment is 10 billion JP Yen.

Shin-Etsu Chemical’s pharmaceutical excipients are made mainly from plant-derived pulp and are widely used, for example as tablet coating agents due to their recognition as being safe for the human body. “Shin-Etsu AQOAT”, which is used in enteric drugs to control the drug delivery target in the human body, is a patented invention by Shin-Etsu Chemical as an enteric coating agent and is supplied all over the world.

In recent years, there has been a focus on its feature of enhancing the solubility of low-dissolving active ingredients, expanding global demand. Shin-Etsu Chemical Co., Ltd. has decided to invest to meet the continuous anticipated increase.