Science History Institute Announces Aloke Lohia Is 2022 Petrochemical Heritage Award Honoree

The Science History Institute is proud to announce that Aloke Lohia, founder and group CEO at Indorama Ventures Public Company Limited (IVL), is the honoree of the 2022 Petrochemical Heritage Award. The award will be presented on March 27, 2022, in San Antonio, Texas, at the International Petrochemical Conference, held by American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM).

“We are delighted to honor Mr. Lohia,” said Institute president and CEO David Cole. “His career is the model example of the entrepreneurship in the petrochemical sector that the Petrochemical Heritage Award was created to recognize.” 

The Petrochemical Heritage Award is awarded annually by the Science History Institute, the Founders Club, and AFPM to recognize an individual’s outstanding contributions to the petrochemical community. This premier award encourages emulation, inspires achievement, and promotes public understanding of modern science, industries, and economies.

About Aloke Lohia

Aloke Lohia founded Indorama Ventures in 1990 and has grown it into the largest polyethylene terephthalate (PET) producer in the world, the largest polyester fiber manufacturer in Thailand, and a major producer of integrated oxides and derivatives. He is the driving force behind the rapid growth of the company, which now has 124 operating sites in 33 counties.

His business ventures began with the founding of Aurus Specialty Chemicals in Thailand in 1988, the family’s first non-textile venture. This small chemical company used plant waste to make furfural. Six years later he went on to establish Indorama Holdings, Thailand’s first worsted wool yarn manufacturer. Lohia then set up Thailand’s first PET production company in 1995 after realizing that the packaging industry material was in great demand but short supply. IVL eventually spread around the globe from North America to Europe, Asia to Africa. Since that first small factory in Thailand, Indorama Ventures has grown to become the largest PET business in the world today.

Indorama Ventures recently expanded its PET/PTA integration even further via the acquisition of the BP Decatur, Alabama, site that includes PX and PTA production, the Old World Industries ethylene oxide/ethylene glycol business with a world-scale manufacturing facility in Bayport, Texas, and the ethylene plant in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

Lohia was born in 1958 in Calcutta, India. He graduated in 1978 with a bachelor of commerce degree from the University of Delhi and holds an honorary doctoral degree of business administration from Rajamangala University of Technology Krungthep in Thailand.