BASF, the largest chemical producer in the world, has been collaborating with LSU chemical engineers to better understand and predict its own production ebbs and flows using artificial intelligence, or AI. The project adds to an ongoing partnership between LSU and BASF to develop emerging STEM talent across disciplines in Louisiana. BASF's chemical manufacturing plant in Geismar in Ascension Parish is one of the company's six largest integrated production sites across 80 countries. It supplies products to a wide variety of industries, including agriculture, construction, energy and health. Chemicals such as solvents, amines, resins, glues, electronic-grade chemicals, industrial gases, basic petrochemicals and inorganic chemicals are produced at Geismar in about 30 interconnected production units, each containing its own subunits.

The Louisiana Economic Development department is using a computer model to help target countries for foreign investment in the state, and the agency says it has hit the mark on some projects. LED built the predictive investment computer model to help hone its strategy about two years ago, leveraging a $170,000 federal grant through the U.S. Economic Development Administration in 2017. The agency tapped into a customized database that parses through investments made across the U.S. by companies in industries suited for Louisiana's existing infrastructure. "You go fishing where the fish are biting," said Larry Collins, executive director of the Office of International Commerce. The fishing expedition produced a five-year snapshot of companies ranging from advanced manufacturing to chemical makers.