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1940
Leonard Parker Pool founded Air Products in 1940 in Detroit, Michigan, and it was his novel idea of "on-site" built oxygen plants at the customer site to produce and sell industrial gases.
Initial sales were slow, so he pivoted and sold oxygen generators to support World War II military efforts.
Air Products leases its first oxygen gas generator to a small Detroit steel company in 1941.
World War II diverts the company's attention to the design and manufacture of mobile generators to produce oxygen for use by the military in high-altitude flights.
In 1944, Air Products moves to Chattanooga, Tennessee and produces 240 oxygen generators for the military.
The company refocuses its sights on commercial markets by setting up headquarters operations near Allentown in Pennsylvania's Lehigh Valley.
1950
Abundant oxygen reshaped the gas industry. Leonard Pool aimed to compete in this "tonnage" gas market, while rising demand for liquid hydrogen — once considered a lab curiosity — opened new opportunities.
Leonard Pool called it the company's largest contract — building plants to supply liquid oxygen and nitrogen for America's growing missile and space program.
The marketing concept known as "piggy-backing" is introduced — building extra gas liquefaction capacity into the on-site plants.
In 1957, Air Products enters the international market for industrial gases through Air Products (Great Britain), Ltd., a joint venture with the Butterley Company.
Air Products began building its Allentown headquarters with offices, manufacturing, and logistics facilities. Over the next six decades, the site grew into the company's central hub.
1960
In 1961, Air Products begins manufacturing chemicals through a joint venture to convert refinery by-products into oxo-alcohols for use in producing plasticizers.
Air Products leveraged its core building-blocks like oxygen and hydrogen to expand, while engineering expertise propelled it to global leadership in helium.
In 1962, the company acquires the Houdry Process Company and its subsidiary, the Catalytic Construction Company.
In the mid-60s, the company widens its global presence with subsidiaries in Belgium, West Germany, and South Africa.
Air Products develops a process for the recovery of helium from natural gas, along with the process to liquefy natural gas using a heat exchanger.
1970
By the 1970s, nitrogen applications grew alongside oxygen, and the company expanded into chemicals and electronics — reaching Fortune 500 status in 1978 with $1 billion in sales.
The business further expands in the '70s with the acquisition of the chemicals and plastics business of Airco, Inc. Over the next 40 years, the polymer emulsions business becomes the U.S. market leader, generating nearly $1 billion in revenues.
Early Cryo-Quick food freezing units helped revolutionize the American restaurant industry, enabling centralized food processing to ensure consistency.
Air Products is awarded a 12-year $287 million contract from NASA to supply liquid hydrogen to the United States' new space shuttle program.
1980
The company expanded globally through equity investments, strengthened its chemicals and electronics sectors, advanced into environmental and energy markets, and established a leading position in refinery hydrogen supply.
Air Products undertakes a strategic global expansion by taking minority positions in industrial gas companies in Korea, Japan, Malaysia, Hong Kong, China, Thailand, Taiwan, and Mexico.
Air Products significantly expands the company's emerging epoxy curing agents business and gains a manufacturing foothold in Europe.
In 1983, Air Products acquired Gardner Cryogenics, which continues today designing and manufacturing high-performance, highly reliable, long lasting storage tanks used to transport hydrogen and helium molecules for the industrial gas industry around the globe.
In the mid-80s, the company forms an environmental and energy systems business to focus on power generation, air pollution control, and energy recovery from solid waste.
1990
Global expansion continued, as did the company's dedication to the electronics industry. Earlier development work with the U.S. government paid dividends, catapulting the company's electronics business to a worldwide leadership position.
In Asia, the company forms joint ventures with Japanese companies Daido Hoxan and Showa Denko to serve the growing electronics industry.
Air Products establishes a new company in Singapore, forms a joint venture in Indonesia, and opens new facilities at Tsukuba, Japan, to supply products to the Asia semiconductor market.
Nitrogen trifluoride — a material originally developed for laser weaponry in the 1960s — becomes the pre-eminent chamber cleaning material for the semiconductor industry. Air Products becomes the worldwide leader in production of this material.
The company acquires Permea, Inc., a leading supplier of membrane and adsorption gas separation systems.
2000
The company strengthens its worldwide leadership in natural gas liquefaction process technology by introducing a debottlenecking process that enables as much as a 60 percent capacity increase in production without sacrificing existing efficiency.
Air Products builds on its surface science expertise by acquiring Tomah³ Products for industrial and institutional cleaning.
Air Products becomes the leading industrial gas supplier in central Europe by acquiring the industrial gas business of BOC Gazy.
2010
In China, Air Products lands its two largest ASU orders ever, the first with Shaanxi Future Energy Chemical Co., Ltd. (12,000 TPD of oxygen) and the second with Shanxi Lu’An Mining (Group) Co., Ltd. (10,000 TPD of oxygen). The ASUs are driven by large-scale coal gasification and petroleum projects throughout China.
Air Products acquires DuPont’s interest in DuPont Air Products NanoMaterials LLC, the two companies’ 50-50 joint venture serving the global semiconductor and wafer polishing industries.
In 2012, Air Products acquires a controlling stake in INDURA, the largest independent industrial gas company in South America at the time. The acquisition brings new sales and gives the company a significant presence in a fourth region of the world.
Air Products acquires EPCO Carbon Dioxide Products, Inc. in 2013, adding liquid CO₂ to its North American offerings through EPCO’s 12 CO₂ purification and liquefaction plants.
In 2015, Air Products is awarded a contract by Saudi Aramco under a JV of Air Products and ACWA Holding to build, own and operate the world's largest industrial gas complex to supply Saudi Aramco's refinery being built in Jazan, Saudi Arabia.
With world energy demands, the environment, and emerging markets always on its radar, Air Products begins engineering, building, owning and operating the world's largest industrial gas projects. Through gasification, the company supplies syngas that enables customers and countries to convert plentiful, lower value materials into higher value products.
Executing on our strategic plan to become a pure-play industrial gas company, Air Products completes the separation of its Electronics Materials Division through the spin-off of Versum Materials, Inc. in 2016, and in 2017 with the sale of its Performance Materials Division to German specialty chemicals producer Evonik Industries AG.
In 2018, Air Products acquires the Rotoflow turboexpander business from Baker Hughes, a GE company.
Air Products' dual acquisitions of Shell and GE gasification technologies expand its technology portfolio, adding expertise in solid feedstocks and liquids gasification to its turnkey syngas solutions for chemicals, fuels, power and refining.
In 2018, Air Products inaugurated its new world-scale industrial gas complex within the Integrated Refinery Expansion Project (IREP) of the BPCL Refinery located in Kochi, India.
Air Products' Kochi Industrial Gas Complex, which generates hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, and steam, is an invaluable supplier of BPCL's IREP to manufacture auto-fuels complying with Euro-IV/Euro-V specifications.
2020
Air Products demonstrates its culture and character as the company stands in solidarity in the world's collective fight against COVID-19. Designated by governments around the world as a "critical industry," Air Products responds to the crisis by continuing to run its facilities safely, delivering critical products to customers, and winning new projects, all while keeping health and safety its top priority.
Air Products, ACWA Power and NEOM sign an agreement for a world-scale carbon-free hydrogen-based ammonia production facility powered by renewable energy. Once operational, the facility will export up to 1.2M tonnes of green ammonia annually, supporting global energy and decarbonization efforts.
Air Products completes construction of its new global corporate headquarters in 2021. Located just over one mile from its previous location in Allentown, the modern, sustainable facilities reflect the company's culture as a world-leading industrial gases company.
In 2023, Air Products signed an agreement with the Government of the Republic of Uzbekistan and Uzbekneftegaz JSC ("UNG") to acquire, own and operate a natural gas-to-syngas processing facility in Qashqadaryo Province, Uzbekistan.
In January 2023, Air Products reached financial close and transfer of the second group of assets for the $12 billion gasification and power JV in Jazan, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Air Products completes the sale of its liquefied natural gas (LNG) process technology and equipment business to Honeywell in September 2024. The company continues focus on its industrial gas business.
Air Products announces its then largest-ever investment in the U.S. in winning a long-term onsite business model supply agreement for a project with Gulf Coast Ammonia (GCA) in Texas City, Texas.
Air Products will build, own and operate (BOO) its largest-ever steam methane reformer to produce hydrogen; BOO an air separation unit (ASU) to supply nitrogen; and will own and operate a steam turbine generator to supply power and other utilities to GCA's new world-scale ammonia production plant.
Air Products announced that construction is underway in Edmonton on a transformative new hydrogen facility, which will deploy advanced technology and an innovative design to deliver net-zero emissions. The net-zero facility will connect to Air Products' existing 55-kilometer pipeline network in the Alberta Heartland to help refining and petrochemical customers reduce the carbon intensity of their operations and products.
The Louisiana Clean Energy Complex will produce low-carbon hydrogen and ammonia for Air Products' Gulf Coast pipeline customers and world markets, positioning Louisiana as a critical player and global leader in next-generation energy production.
In August 2025, Air Products announced it has successfully completed the first fill of the world's largest hydrogen sphere at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) Kennedy Space Center located on Merritt Island, Florida. NASA uses liquid hydrogen combined with liquid oxygen as fuel in cryogenic rocket engines.