Dow Completes Rohm and Haas Acquisition
The Dow Chemical Company recently announced that it has completed its acquisition of Rohm and Haas.
The acquisition is a major step in Dow's strategy of growing its performance products and specialty portfolio to deliver more consistent earnings growth. Combining the two organizations' best-in-class technologies, broad geographic reach, and strong market channels will create a $14 billion diversified business portfolio, which will be called Dow's Advanced Materials division. The division is intended to achieve $3 billion in additional value growth opportunities, as well as annual cost synergies of $1.3 billion.
Rohm and Haas is the key element in Dow's new Advanced Materials division. Pierre Brondeau has been named president and chief executive officer of this division, which includes: Coatings, Building and Construction, Specialty Materials, Adhesives and Functional Polymers, and Electronic Materials.
On Jan. 23, Dow entered into a consent order with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission that permitted the completion of the acquisition, provided that certain actions to address potential anti-competitive effects are implemented within 240 days of the deal closing. Specifically, under the terms of that agreement, Dow is required to divest the following businesses:
- Clear Lake, Texas, acrylic acid and esters plant and the related glacial acrylic acid, butyl acrylate, and ethyl acrylate businesses in North, Central, and South America
- UCAR Emulsion Systems specialty latex businesses in North America
- North American hollow plastic pigment business (also referred to as the hollow sphere particle business)
The consent order also includes an Order to Hold Separate which requires Dow to maintain the competitiveness of these businesses pending their divestiture and to ensure that confidential information is not transferred between these businesses and the other businesses of Dow.
Dow has already initiated procedures to comply with the FTC consent order and has been actively seeking buyers for the impacted businesses. The acquisition previously received regulatory clearance from the European Commission on Jan. 8.