Orlen Group

The Orlen group (PKN Orlen, Polish: Polski Koncern Naftowy Orlen) (WSE: PKN) is a major Polish oil refiner and petrol retailer. The company is a significant European publicly traded firm with major operations in Poland, Czech Republic, Germany, and the Baltic States.

Orlen is the largest fuel retailer in Poland with over 2000 locations. The company runs the most advanced and the second largest complex for terephthalic acid production in Europe. It also has significant investment abroad including the buy out of Mažeikių Nafta and a majority stake in Unipetrol, a Czech refiner. In 2003 PKN Orlen had the chance to acquire 500 filling stations in Northern Germany from BP under premise of an anti-competition rule when BP took over Aral. As of 2007 Orlen has 581 filling stations in Germany (484 under the Star brand, 58 under the Orlen brand and 29 under a supermarket brand).

Orlen bought a majority stake in Czech Unipetrol. During May 2006, the company announced its largest investment ever when it took over a majority share of Lithuania's Mažeikių Nafta, the largest company in the Baltic States, from Yukos. With the completion of the takeover, PKN Orlen became Central Europe's largest company.

Orlen, under a joint venture with the Netherlands firm Basell, also owns Poland's largest plastics company.

ORLEN Poludnie

The business activity of ORLEN Południe S.A. focuses on the primary product segments related to the production and sales of biofuels and biocomponents, paraffin and solvents. Consistently developed technologies, emphasis on the development of know-how and a series of optimization initiatives are the foundations of the Company’s development towards a bio-refinery. The company’s offer is supplemented by products obtained through petroleum processing and oil regeneration.

The company’s paraffin activity bases on company-owned paraffin hydro-refining installation, the only and the most innovative in this part of Europe. State of the art technological solutions and high-quality raw material guarantee the safety and quality of products manufactured. Forecasts for the paraffin sector anticipate the growth in sales of high-margin products and entry into new market segments. The innovative petroleum solvent production installation launched in 2007 provides low-sulfur and low-aromatic petroleum solvents, which compete with the currently marketed global products in terms of boiling point.