Kickstart: Let's hope we don't have a Groundhog Day repeat of 2021 weather

If we're lucky, Groundhog Day arrives without an expected cold snap and storm. But officials in Texas are warning that a "very substantial" arctic cold front passing through the region between today and Sunday could stress power supply in the state.

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) and other officials in Texas say the power grid has improved since severe cold hit material makers and molders (and residents) of Texas in mid-February 2021.

Let's hope so.

The 2021 storm led to massive material shortages as resin suppliers struggled to bring production back online after catastrophic power failures in most areas of Texas. The shortage, in turn, led to skyrocketing prices and material shortfalls that left molders scrambling for months.

"We are utilizing every applicable state agency to make sure that Texas will robustly respond to this extreme cold winter storm that is going to be sweeping across Texas," Gov. Greg Abbott said during a Feb. 1 briefing. "They're already bringing more generation online sooner than what happened last year. They have additional crews already deployed."

We hinted earlier that the final mergers and acquisitions numbers for 2021 would be big. As M&A experts told PN's Frank Esposito, though, the activity for new deals set records.

"It was unlike anything I've ever seen," John Hart, managing director at P&M Corporate Finance in Southfield, Mich., told Frank. "The whole year was extremely active, but the fourth quarter really catapulted it to the next level. It was mayhem there at the end with so many deals closing."

PMCF said the M&A plastics deals it tracked were up 75 percent vs. 2020 and rose throughout the year with 30 percent of the nearly 500 deals being completed in the final three months of the year.

Reasons for the rise varied. Some purchases came from family-owned companies seeking to exit while prices were good. Some sellers wanted to avoid potential tax increases. Sales in the health care industry were hot thanks to the pandemic. And some people simply were worn down by all of struggles of finding materials, workers, transportation and other goods and decided it was time to step away. Think of it as the Great Liquidation by owners who wanted to cash out, rather than the Great Resignation of employees.

You can find links to all of Frank's stories here.

Meanwhile, one very well-established company created by an M&A continues to refine itself. As of Feb. 1, the German maker of the Mercedes brand of cars officially changed its corporate name from Daimler AG to Mercedes-Benz Group AG.

The company has been around since 1926, when Carl Benz and Gottlieb Daimler merged their companies.

The new name comes as Mercedes-Benz puts its emphasis on passenger vehicles. As of December, the Frankfurt-based company has shuffled its Daimler commercial truck business into an independent company, Daimler Truck Holding AG.

Whatever name the corporation uses, the cars it makes will continue to be big users of plastics as it puts increased emphasis on electric and autonomous vehicles "by taking the lead in electric mobility and vehicle software," Chairman Ola Källenius said in a news release.