DuPont Co. has opted not to sell its share of the DuPont Teijin Films joint venture.
CEO Ed Breen confirmed that move on a Feb. 9 conference call. The JV makes films out of PET and polyethylene naphthalate (PEN), sold under Mylar and other brand names.
Wilmington, Del.-based DuPont and Teijin Ltd. of Osaka, Japan, own equal stakes in the JV. DuPont's films business, including DuPont Teijin, ranks as North America's seventh-largest film and sheet company, according to Plastics News, with estimated 2019 sales of $1.25 billion.
DuPont Teijin is one of the world's largest producers of polyester film. DuPont also announced it would hold on to its Tedlar-brand polyvinyl fluoride business and its microcircuit materials business.
Breen said the businesses are down right now because of their end markets. "We think there is nice upside coming into these businesses," he added. "It would not have been productive to sell them."
"I don't think it would have been good for our shareholders. And we see some good long-term trends there. So, we made this decision strategically to hold on to them and don't expect them to be up for sale during the year."
"That's not what we're doing. We're putting them in there and we're going to run them."
The DuPont Teijin unit first was placed up for sale in May 2019, shortly before DuPont ended its brief merger with Dow Inc.
A previous deal to sell DuPont Teijin to Indorama Ventures Public Co. Ltd. was announced in late 2017 but was canceled.