DuPont has agreed to divest an 80.1% share in the Delrin polyacetal (POM) homopolymer business to private equity company TJC LP. The is valued at $1.8 billion and is expected to close around the end of this year. When the deal closes, DuPont will retain a 19.9% non-controlling common equity interest in the Delrin business.
In 2022, DuPont sold its engineering plastics business to Celanese for $11 billion, saying at the time that the proceeds would fund the acquisition of Rogers Corp. The Rogers deal was subsequently scrapped because DuPont was unable to receive clearance from Chinese regulators in a timely manner. The divestiture to Celanese did not include POM on account of Celanese's existing market-leading position for the resin with its Celcon and Hostaform acetal resins.
The divestiture of the Delrin business will effectively mark DuPont's exit from polymerization activities for commodity and engineering plastics. Historically DuPont was a leading producer of resins such as EVA, polyamide (the company was the inventor of Nylon), Crastin PBT, Rynite PET, Hytrel thermoplastic elastomers, and Vamac elastomers.
Today, DuPont's focus is clearly on value-added converted products such as Tyvek film for construction and packaging, Tedlar PVF sheet for solar module backsheets, Kevlar aramid fiber for aerospace and military applications, Kapton polyimide electronic films, and Styrofoam extruded polystyrene (XPS) insulation sheet.
Image courtesy of DuPont.