W.R. Grace sets stage for Construction Products spin off, rebranding

Sources: W.R. Grace & Co., Columbia, Md.; CP staff

W. R. Grace has named Adam Grose president of the Specialty Construction Chemicals business anchoring GCP Applied Technologies Inc.—the Cambridge, Mass.-based public company to be formed through an early-2016 spin-off of the Construction Products segment and Darex Packaging Technologies.

Grose will lead a business providing products, technologies and services to the concrete and cement markets globally. He has served for three years as vice president and general manager of Grace Construction Products’ Asia operations and, since 2013, in those same capacities with the company’s Discovery Sciences business. Prior to Grace he held senior leadership positions with Thermo Fisher Scientific, Invensys Controls (Schneider Electric) and General Electric.

“Leading the cement and concrete products business is essential to maintaining our leadership in these sectors and to achieving our growth goals,” says GCP Applied Technology’s designated President and CEO Gregory Poling. “Grose has a proven ability to lead global teams, introduce new products, and create opportunities in new geographic markets.”

GCP Applied Technologies will have customers in more than 110 countries, operations on six continents, and a team of 2,500 employees. Through knowledge and service excellence, officials contend, it will provide premier specialty construction chemicals and building materials for many of the world’s most renowned structures, plus packaging technologies for the best-known consumer brands.

W.R. Grace announced in February 2015 a split into two public entities: a) the namesake business encompassing petroleum and chemical processing-driven Catalysts and Materials Technologies; and, then-New Grace, now GCP Applied Technologies, over the Construction Products and Darex Packaging operations.

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