DuPont is splitting up
Following the Dow DuPont merger (2017) and de-merger (2019), DuPont has been selling its “commodity” businesses, like the $11 billion sale of its mobility and materials business to Celanese and the sale of its polyacetyl business. DuPont has instead been leaning into specialties, like the acquisition of Laird’s electronic materials business and the acquisition of Spectrum Plastics. This is pretty typical, since specialty chemical companies grow by finding more tangentially related specialties, and then shedding the businesses that end up with abnormally high or low margins, so long as that business has a buyer or it can stand on its own. In the high-margin cases, the shedding happens because that business unit’s ability to grow will be impeded by the other businesses, simply because investors seeking high-margin businesses can’t invest without simultaneously investing in DuPont’s lower-margin businesses. So, in a classic shareholder-maximizing move, DuPont will be splitting itself into three publicly traded companies: electronic materials, water solutions, and industrial solutions.
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