NewPage Corp. (www.newpagecorp.com) of Miamisburg, OH, will acquire Stora Enso's (www.storaenso.com) paper-manufacturing operations in North America for approximately $1.5 billion in cash, a $200 million note and a 19.9 percent equity interest in the new company. The deal is expected to close during the first quarter of 2008. The new company, which will retain the NewPage name and be headquartered in Miamisburg, will become a leader in publication, fine and specialty papers including label stocks.

Boise Cascade LLC (www.bc.com/packaging/package.jsp) will sell its Paper, Packaging & Newsprint segments to Aldabra 2 Acquisition Corp. (www.aldabra-corp2.com) of New York for about $1.625 billion. At closing, Aldabra will be renamed Boise Paper Co. The Packaging Business is a leading supplier of corrugated sheets, boxes, and newsprint in North America with revenue of approximately $784 million.

Substrate provider The Klöckner Pentaplast Group (www.kpfilms.com) will add production capacity for thermoformable and food-packaging polyester films at its Beaver, WV, facility. Startup is targeted for March 2008. The increased volume was not disclosed.

Helsinki, Finland based substrate provider Ahlstrom (www.ahlstrom.com) forms a joint venture with Brazil's Votorantim Celulose e Papel (VCP). The JV was created for specialty-papers production and will be located in Jacarei, Brazil, close to São Paolo. The annual specialty-paper production capacity of the joint venture is approximately 110,000 metric tons and will serve mainly the labeling applications and certain flexible-packaging markets.