Formosa Plastics history

In 1983, Wang acquired Manville Corporation's bankrupt PVC pipe operations for $20 million cash and a $10 million note.

Nan Ya Plastics Wharton started its first PVC (Poly Vinyl Chloride)rigid film calender line in November of 1984.

In a lengthy 1985 profile of the Wang empire for Forbes, Andrew Tanzer quoted one competitor who asserted that "[Wang] doesn't play by the rules.

In 1988, when the first federal Toxics Release Inventory named Calhoun County--home of the Point Comfort plant--the most polluted county in the United States, the focus on Formosa intensified.

6 Naptha Cracker in collusion with the KMT developmentalist state provoked mass outrage, leading to a protest of 20,000 against a proposed chemical complex by Formosa Plastics in December 1990—this being a landmark protest in Taiwan’s transition from authoritarian rule to democracy.

1992: Formosa Petrochemical Corporation is founded to take charge of the construction in Taiwan of an oil refinery, naphtha cracking plant, and cogeneration plant.

In November 1993, Formosa and FIC pooled $2.3 million to rescue Everex Systems, a California manufacturer of "high-end" personal computers, and Wang installed daughter Cher at its head.

In 1994, she told Pete Engardio of Business Week that she chose the computer industry because it was "something he [Y. C. Wang] knew nothing about." Son Winston told Fortune's Louis Kraar that he'd "never seen a decision made by anybody except the chairman."

Late in 1995, however, scandal erupted at Formosa when it emerged that Winston Wang was having an extramarital affair with one of his graduate students at Taiwan University.

When the younger Wang returned to Taiwan in November 1996, however, the expected reconciliation between father and son did not materialize.

Wang's goal was to have the Nan Ya plant producing 2,500-wafers worth of chips per month by 1997.

In 1999, Formosa Plastics used bribes to dump 3000 tons of mercury-laden waste in Sihanoukville, Cambodia – three local villagers died shortly afterwards, although a report commissioned by the World Health Organisation concluded it was unlikely the deaths were due to mercury poisoning.

There was another expansion in 2002, and the massive plant is now responsible for a variety of plastics production.

Although the petrochemical industry in general entered a prolonged slump in the early years of the 20th century, Formosa continued to flourish: by June 2003, Formosa was able to foresee a profit of NT$12.41 billion for the upcoming fiscal year.

The incident is still being investigated, and the CSB has not yet announced whether or not the plant failed to implement the safety procedures recommended after the fire in 2005.

Yet, ironically, in 2009, Formosa Plastics would be issued the “Black Planet Award for destructive environmental and economic practices causing wreckage, havoc, and death” by German environmental NGO Ethecon.

APET production began at the end of 2011.

At the time of the May 2013 accident, the Formosa Plastics website claimed that the plant recently achieved 3 million man-hours without a lost-time injury.

New Bloom is an online magazine covering activism and youth politics in Taiwan and the Asia Pacific, founded in Taiwan in 2014 in the wake of the Sunflower Movement.

In 2015, the Formosa Plastics Corporation ranked as the world’s fifth largest chemical company by sales.