On April 5, 2017, the Korea Fair Trade Commission
("KFTC") granted conditional clearance of the proposed
merger of the Dow Chemical Company("Dow") and E. I. du
Pont de Nemours and Company ("DuPont"), requiring a
divestiture of ethylene acrylic acid (EAA) copolymers and ionomers
business related assets.
According to the KFTC's press release, the proposed merger
does not raise competitive concerns in the seed, pesticide, and
other chemical-related industries because both Dow and DuPont have
low market shares in these markets and indeed there are no business
overlaps. On the other hand, the KFTC examined the market
concentration, unilateral effect, and coordination effect in the
EAA copolymers and ionomers market and concluded that the
transaction will likely practically restrict competition in the
market.
