Petro-Chem announces Combination with Heurtey

New York, January 15, 2008 – Petro-Chem Development Co., Inc. (Petro-Chem) announced today that it has agreed to be acquired by Heurtey Petrochem S. A. (Heurtey).  This combination of New York-based Petro-Chem and Paris-based Heurtey will create the world’s largest provider of direct fired heaters to the global refinery and petrochemical industries. Specific terms of the transaction were not disclosed.  Heurtey is a publicly traded company that is listed on the Alternext d' Euronext Paris Exchange, an affiliate of the NYSE, under the stock symbol ALHPC.

Similar to Petro-Chem, Heurtey is an engineering company that specializes in providing direct fired heaters to refineries and petrochemical facilities.  Heurtey has a particularly strong presence in Europe, Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Asia.  This nicely complements Petro-Chem’s strong presence in the North American, South American and Asian markets.  Upon completion of this transaction, Heurtey Petro-Chem will have 12 offices worldwide (3 in the United States, 4 in Europe, 1 in Africa and 2 in India, 1 in Singapore and 1 in Korea) and approximately 500 employees.

Michel Pingeot, Chairman and CEO of Heurtey commented, “We are pleased to combine the capabilities and resources of these two companies, which will create the undisputed leader in our industry. Heurtey and Petro-Chem will be able to provide our customers with a breadth of technical solutions which are unparalleled. In addition, together, we will cover all the key geographic regions around the globe in great depth. We have known, and worked successfully together with, the principals and management team of Petro-Chem for many years, including, most notably, the formation of our successful Middle Eastern joint venture in 2005. This is another step designed to produce enhanced solutions for our customers and to realize the common management objective of both companies which is to build the world’s leading supplier of direct fired heater solutions.”

Stephen T. Limpe, President and CEO of Petro-Chem stated, “We are extremely excited about this combination – it is unprecedented in our industry. Our two companies share a 45 year history of successful collaboration in connection with various projects.  Both companies will benefit from global project execution capabilities (North America, South America, Europe, Eastern Europe, Middle East, Africa and Asia) as well as technical leadership in refining, aromatics, reforming and cracking technologies. Our clients will benefit from our enhanced ability to execute large, complex projects.”

“This combination establishes the opportunity for a cross selling of our technologies and skill sets in each other’s geographic markets and will benefit and deepen our customer relationships. Petro-Chem will contribute expertise in heavy oil processing, aromatics, and revamping services to Heurtey’s core markets in Europe and the Middle East. Conversely, Petro-Chem will now be in a position to offer its clients advanced reforming and cracking furnaces utilized in hydrogen and ethylene production.  There is virtually no overlap between the two companies,” stated Mr. Limpe.

“We have tremendous respect for Heurtey’s capabilities. At the end of the day, we wanted to build the optimal platform to provide “best of class” solutions in thermal technology to process the increasingly large and complex projects around the world. Simply put, this combination realizes that objective,” Mr. Limpe added.

Michel Pingeot concluded, “Upon completion of this transaction, the current Petro-Chem shareholders will become significant shareholders of Heurtey. Petro-Chem will remain an independently operated business within the Heurtey family of companies and the management structure and team of both companies will remain intact. The positive momentum we have built in our respective operations over the last 5 years will be enhanced by the robust technical services we will provide to our combined customer relationships and the improved financial resources available to a larger, publicly traded and established entity.”

The closing is subject to the approval of the shareholders of Heurtey.  It is anticipated that this transaction will become effective following a meeting of such shareholders at the beginning of the second quarter of 2008.  Following the closing, Michel Pingeot will serve as the Chairman of Petro-Chem.  Stephen T. Limpe will continue to lead Petro-Chem as its President and Chief Executive Officer and Anthony T. Limpe will remain on the Board of Petro-Chem as its Vice Chairman and a Director.

About Petro Chem:

Petro-Chem Development Co., Inc. is one of the world’s leading providers of process furnaces and direct fired heaters to oil refineries and petrochemical plants throughout the world.  Founded in 1939, Petro-Chem and its affiliates and licensees have designed and produced over 10,000 process furnaces for over 500 clients around the world.  Petro-Chem is headquartered in New York, NY USA with offices in Tulsa, OK; Houston, TX; Seoul, Korea, Pune, India and joint venture companies in the Middle East with Heurtey Petrochem SA and in China with an affiliate of Sinopec. Visit www.petro-chemusa.com. 

About Heurtey:

Founded in 1953, Heurtey designs, studies, manufactures, and installs complex sets of process furnaces for the transformation of hydrocarbons into derived products with an expertise which goes from the feasibility studies through the execution of turn-key projects. Since its creation, Heurtey has designed or produced more than 2,500 cracking, refining and reforming furnaces establishing it as a global leader in its industry. Headquartered in Paris, Heurtey maintains subsidiary company offices in London, Bucharest, Hamburg, Johannesburg, Mumbai, and Singapore.  Heurtey’s client base includes the largest global oil companies.  In 2006 Heurtey Petrochem realized a sales turnover of 81.3 mm Euros. Heurtey Petrochem securities are traded on the Alternext d' Euronext Paris Exchange (ALHPC).  Visit www.heurtey.com.

For further information, contact: Stephen T. Limpe, +1-212-455-6500; PR@petro-chemusa.com or Michel Pingeot – Président 011 33 (0)1 41 93 80 23 heurtey@heurtey.com