Dow Chemical Co. and DuPont Co., two global chemical companies with major plastics businesses, may be near an agreement to merge, according to published reports.

The Wall Street Journal first posted the news on its website on Dec. 8. The report cites unnamed people familiar with the matter. Other business press also reported the news, including Bloomberg, also attributing the news to unnamed sources.

According to their reports, the talks are in an advanced stage and a deal could be announced this week, but there is still no guarantee that a deal will be consummated.

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On Nov. 2, the company announced another major change that involved plastics: a plan to consolidate two of its plastics-related units into a single business. As of Jan. 1, DuPont’s Performance Polymers unit will merge with Packaging & Industrial Polymers. DuPont also is merging its Protection and Building Innovations units.

“By bringing these business units together under common management structures, we are creating business of more significant scale to better serve our customers,” Chairman and CEO Edward Breen said at the time.

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Report: Liveris to head merged firm

According to The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg reports, representatives of DuPont and Dow declined to comment. But the reports have interesting details on what the merged companies would look like and who would be in charge.

According to the WSJ report, after the merger, the company would split up into separate agricultural, materials and material sciences, and specialty products businesses.

According to that report, Liveris has pursued DuPont for more than 10 years, and he contacted Breen about a deal in October.

The WSJ speculated that Liveris would be chairman of the merged company, and Breen would be CEO.

Combining DuPont and Dow would be an interesting merger of different corporate cultures. Both companies have long histories as specialty chemical companies.

Both are major players in commodity resins, to be sure, although DuPont’s plastics portfolio is heavy on engineering materials like nylon and specialty polyesters, while Dow is better known for commodity resins including polyethylene.

Both companies are global giants, but they have roots in small-town America. Dow is the largest employer in Midland, a Midwestern enclave with a population of about 42,000, while DuPont is entrenched in the East Coast city of Wilmington, with a population of about 70,000.

The companies have crossed paths before, notably in 1996, when they combined their specialty rubber businesses into a 50:50 joint venture, DuPont Dow Elastomers. But that venture lasted less than a decade.

At the time of the breakup of the joint venture, Balaji Singh of Chemical Market Resources Inc. wrote that: “DuPont Dow as an organization could not survive the general organizational issues that are independent of its overall goals and objectives.”

Singh wrote that the joint venture failed to integrate DuPont and Dow cultures to develop a new start-up with its own identity and culture.

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