Built around the evolvingneeds of wood panel manufacturers, Hexion’s latest investments strengthen itsability to create measurable, customer-specific value at scale. Following theintroduction of its Chemistry-as-a-Service™ (CaaS) model at the WorldPetrochemicals Conference in Houston, the company today highlights a series ofleadership appointments designed to accelerate an AI-first, performance-basedmodel that helps customers improve output, reduce variability, and unlockstronger economics. These appointments reflect the next phase of Hexion’stransformation, as experienced industry leaders join the company to helpreshape how value is created across wood panel manufacturing.

Hexion is sharpening itsfocus on wood panel engineering and performance, an emphasis furtherunderscored by the divestiture of its commodity formalin business in late 2025.In wood panel manufacturing, variability in production and raw material usagecreates a meaningful opportunity to improve throughput, quality, and costperformance. Across the industry, performance remains constrained byvariability, disconnected systems, and reactive decision-making, which areconditions where small inefficiencies quickly compound and limit overallresults.

Hexion’s CaaS model isdesigned to close this gap. By embedding our deep expertise in cellulosematerials together with wood panel process data, environmental inputs, andAI-driven models directly into plant operations, we create a closed-loop systemthat continuously learns and improves. Instead of relying on staticformulations and periodic, or seasonal, adjustments, customers benefit fromongoing optimization across resin usage, tree consumption, throughput, uptime,quality stability, and energy efficiency. The results are tangible: more than a10% reduction in resin usage, over 5% improvement in uptime, and more than a10% reduction in energy consumption and waste.

“Selling chemicals is nolonger enough. Customers are buying performance,” said Michael Lefenfeld,President and CEO. “We introduced our new performance-driven model at WPC andwe have built the leadership team to execute it. This is a different way ofoperating, working alongside customers to continuously improve their operationalperformance and, in turn, strengthen ours.”

To execute this shift,Hexion has recently appointed the following leaders:

Pedro Lopes, ChiefCommercial Officer – Lopes leadsHexion’s global commercial organization, aligning customer needs, productdevelopment, and go-to-market execution to drive growth and adoption ofperformance-based solutions. He joins from Kraton Corporation, where he heldsenior leadership roles advancing commercial performance across globalspecialty materials businesses. Before that, he held leadership roles atArizona Chemical.

Gaël De Martelaere,Chief Procurement Officer – DeMartelaere oversees Procurement and Supply Chain, strengthening coordinationacross Hexion’s global network to improve reliability, cost performance, andspeed. He joins from Dow, where he spent more than 23 years in procurement andsupply chain leadership, most recently as Vice President of Direct Procurementand previously across other procurement and supply chain roles.

Sambit Dutta, SeniorVice President, AI Transformation –Dutta leads the development of Hexion’s AI and data platform, which underpinsits ability to deliver continuous, real-time optimization across customeroperations. He brings more than 27 years of experience leading AI and digitalprograms, recently at Nestlé, and before that, Ecolab, where he deliveredmeasurable impact across multiple business functions. He began his career atDeloitte in technology consulting.

Chandradev Mehta, SeniorVice President, Strategy and Business Development – Mehta leads enterprise strategy, M&A, andstrategic partnerships, with a focus on scaling growth platforms in Buildingand Construction and adjacent markets. He joins from Honeywell, where he ledcorporate development efforts totaling more than $5 billion in acquisitions.Before that, he was at LyondellBasell, leading global strategy and development.

Ann Lindsey, Head ofEnterprise Operational Integrity & EHS – Lindsey leads Hexion’s global Environmental, Health and Safetystrategy, advancing enterprise-wide programs that reinforce operationalintegrity, strengthen consistent safety fundamentals, and drive accountabilityacross every site and role. Most recently, she served as Managing Director,U.S., at HSE Global, where she advised boards, CEOs, and site leaders. Shebrings more than two decades of experience in risk management, compliance, andsafety culture transformation, and has also held leadership roles at DecisionPoint Associations and her own firm, Lindsey Consulting.

Arash Nejad, VicePresident, Commercial Leader, SmartSystems – Nejad leads global commercial strategy for Hexion’s SmartSystemsbusiness, advancing the deployment of automation and digital technologies intocustomer operations. He brings experience from leadership roles at NovarcTechnologies, Weir Motion Metrics, Rockwell Automation, and GE.

Following 18%year-over-year EBITDA growth in the face of significant headwinds, Hexioncontinues to invest in capabilities and products that strengthen execution,accelerate decision-making, and support long-term performance across its coremarkets. These appointments position Hexion to scale a more connected,performance-driven model, one that reduces variability, improves consistency,and delivers measurable results for customers.