Don Duncan and Chris Pappas have been named to head the Dow Chemical Co. and DuPont Co. joint venture that will combine Dow's metallocene catalyst technology with DuPont's synthetic rubbers business. Duncan, general manager of the DuPont Elastomers Strategic Business Unit, has been named president and chief executive officer of the new venture, named DuPont Dow Elastomers. Potential sales for the company are estimated to be $2 billion within five years, reflecting a growth rate of more than twice the industry average, officials of both firms announced Sept. 21 in New York.
Pappas of Dow Plastics will be global business vice president in charge of ethylene elastomers based on Dow's proprietary Insite technology. Most recently, he served as Dow's director of marketing of polyolefins and elastomers.
Don Faught of DuPont Elastomers will become global business vice president of high-performance elastomers. Theo Krapels of DuPont Elastomers will be vice president of operations.
Ashby Rice of Dow Plastics will be vice president of technology.
The company will determine what elastomer products it will make, as well as a location for the company's headquarters, in the next few months.
The official start-up is scheduled for the first quarter of 1996.
``DuPont Dow Elastomers will link DuPont's strength in marketing synthetic rubber with Dow's Insite technology,'' Duncan said in a news release. ``Combining the science of DuPont and Dow will greatly enhance our ability to meet rapidly evolving customer needs on a global basis by providing the broadest portfolio of elastomer products in the world, from ethylene elastomers to fluoroelastomers.''
The new company will focus on the discovery, development, production and sale of thermoset and thermoplastic elastomer products used primarily in the automotive, chemical processing, general rubber, wire and cable, construction, molded goods, durable adhesives and oil and polymer modification markets.
DuPont and Dow originally announced their signing of a letter of intent to create such an enterprise in January 1995.
