Dow Chemical to buy remaining stake in JV with Corning

Chemical giants DuPont and Dow Chemical Co have agreed to merge in an all-stock deal valuing the combined company at $US130 billion ($A178 billion), with plans to eventually split into three. The plan is to then split DowDuPont into three companies, one focused materials, one on agriculture and the last on specialty products.

Executives boast that the two companies have complementary offerings in packaging, especially in multilayered structures, where, for example, DuPont's Surlyn resin might be used with Dow's linear low-density polyethylene. Edward Breen, now DuPont's CEO, will become the new company's CEO.

Antitrust specialists also expect the deal to face close examination. The agriculture sector will likely receive the most scrutiny.

NEW YORK - Dow Chemical, DuPont and Yahoo didn't so much leap toward new corporate futures this week.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said in a statement that the proposed merger "demands serious scrutiny".

Nonetheless, the announcement - which will see Dow shareholders take over 52% of the combined company, and DuPont investors 48% - failed to support the companies' shares, which had already risen in anticipation of the tie-up.

Material Science Company: A pure-play industrial leader, consisting of DuPont's Performance Materials segment, as well as Dow's Performance Plastics, Performance Materials and Chemicals, Infrastructure Solutions, and Consumer Solutions (excluding the Dow Electronic Materials business) operating segments. The companies also say their businesses pair well in automotive applications, with Dow specializing in materials for auto interiors and DuPont proficient in plastics for under-the-hood applications. That behemoth would serve as a vehicle for cutting some $3 billion in costs before splitting into three separate businesses 18 to 24 months after the merger closes.

DuPont makes products used in a variety of industries, from pharmaceuticals to construction.

It's been a bumpy 2015 for DuPont, whose legacy reaches back to 1802 when E. I. du Pont built a series of gunpowder mills along the banks of the Brandywine River near Wilmington, Delaware, where the company is still based.

Thousands of people work at Dow Chemical in Midland.

"We will gain significant synergies through seed production cost efficiencies by maximizing the R&D programs of the two companies and through the optimization of our production and supply chains", DuPont CEO Ed Breen, who will become CEO of the combined DowDuPont, told investors Friday morning.

Dow in May announced a 3 percent reduction in its global workforce - between 1,500 and 1,750 job cuts - as part of an earlier bid to jettison its chlorine business.

"It's time for federal regulators to remember that bigger isn't always better and that the economic power of our nation was built on the concept of having many players in the marketplace competing for customers and driving innovation", said the group's president, Roger Johnson. Dow Chemical was off 2.8 percent at $53.37. Under the merger's exchange ratio, DuPont shareholders would receive $70.38 a share, based on Thursday's closing prices, or a total of $61.7 billion. The board of the new company would have 16 directors, evenly divided between current Dow and DuPont directors. It said on Friday it would buy the remaining stake in the joint venture from Corning Inc.

"We are creating the world's leading agriculture company by bringing together DuPont's unrivalled market access and industry-leading germplasm and breeding capabilities, and Dow strengths and traits and crop protection". The combined adjusted revenue of that business was about $13 billion in 2014.