Cosmo Oil Company

Cosmo Oil Company, Limited (コスモ石油株式会社, Kosumo Sekiyu Kabushiki-gaisha) is a Japanese petrochemical company. It is Japan's third-biggest refiner by sales after JX Holdings and Idemitsu Kosan.

History

Cosmo traces its corporate roots to Maruzen Petroleum (丸善石油株式会社), a company established in 1931, although the oil business operated by Maruzen was originally established by Zenzo Matsumura in Kobe in 1907.

Cosmo Oil Company was formed on April 1, 1986, through the merger of Maruzen Petroleum and Daikyo Petroleum, a group of oil businesses based in Niigata Prefecture which merged in 1939.

A major fire occurred at the Cosmo refinery in Ichihara as a result of the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake. It was extinguished after ten days, killing or injuring six people, and destroying storage tanks

In February 2015, the company said it will reorganize itself under a holding company to boost profitability. Also in 2015, in March, Cosmo Oil formed an LPG joint-venture by merging its LPG business with three other company's LPG units. The new company, named Gyxis Corporation will start effective operations on April 1, 2015. Along Cosmo the other three shareholding companies are Showa Shell Sekiyu, TonenGeneral Sekiyu, and Sumitomo Corporation, all with 25% of the ownership.