Producer
Cabot Corporation
One of the world's three largest carbon black producers; tire-grade carbon black (Specialty Fluids, Reinforcement Materials segment) accounts for ~70% of Cabot revenue; operates plants across the Americas, Europe, and Asia supplying all major tire manufacturers.
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Inputs supplied
2
Goods downstream
2
Facilities
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Stories
What they make
2 inputs Cabot Corporation supplies
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Goods downstream
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Where they make it
2 facilities
Cabot Carbon Black — Texas Gulf Coast Plants →
USTexas / Louisiana, USA · processing_plant
Multiple carbon black reactors on US Gulf Coast using aromatic oil feedstock from petroleum refineries; ~300,000 t/yr combined US capacity; carbon black plants require co-location near aromatic oil (Calumet, Ergon) to minimize feedstock transport
Cabot Norit Americas Activated Carbon — Marshall, Texas →
USMarshall, Texas · processing_plant
Cabot Norit's primary US activated carbon production facility; Norit brand acquired by Cabot from European ownership; produces both powdered activated carbon (PAC) for municipal water treatment and GAC for residential and industrial filters; lignite coal-based carbon for larger-volume municipal applications
What else they do
Business segments
The company's full revenue map, where this supply-chain role fits within their broader business.
Reinforcement Materials (Carbon Black)
68%Performance Chemicals
18%Activated Carbon
14%
Intelligence
What's known
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Did you know2021
Cabot Corporation acquired the Norit activated carbon business from a Dutch company in 2012 — making the same company that makes carbon black for tire treads also the dominant supplier of activated carbon for drinking water filtration Cabot Corporation acquired Norit N.V. (Netherlands) in 2012 for approximately $1.08B, adding Norit's activated carbon business to its existing carbon black portfolio. Norit is one of the world's oldest and largest activated carbon producers, with roots in Dutch peat-based carbon going back to 1918. Post-acquisition, Cabot's "Performance Chemicals" segment encompasses both tire-grade carbon black and water/air purification activated carbon — structurally unrelated products from a customer perspective, but united by the underlying skill of controlled carbon processing chemistry. Cabot Norit's Marshall, Texas facility uses lignite (lignite-based GAC) for high-volume municipal applications, while coconut shell carbon for household filters comes via Asian sourcing.
Cabot Corporation ↗Origin2023
Cabot Corporation was founded in 1882 by Godfrey Lowell Cabot, a Harvard-educated chemist from the Boston Cabot family (one of the oldest New England merchant dynasties), who identified a business opportunity in the natural gas wells of Pennsylvania and West Virginia. Natural gas wells produced a black sooty residue called lampblack when burned; Cabot saw this as a commercially valuable pigment for printer's ink and paint. He developed processes to collect and purify the carbon black byproduct and built a business selling it to printers and coatings manufacturers. When Charles Goodyear's vulcanized rubber was improved with carbon black reinforcement (discovered around 1910), Cabot's existing carbon black production infrastructure gave it immediate access to the rapidly growing tire industry. A Boston Brahmin family's natural gas soot business from 1882 became one of the three dominant global suppliers of the material that reinforces every rubber tire.
Cabot Corporation ↗