With the two giants of industry standing alongside each other, Bayer CEO Werner Baumann and Monsanto CEO Hugh Grant jointly announced Bayer’s $66 billion takeover of Monsanto today (Sept. 14).
“This is truly a historic day for Bayer and for Monsanto,” Baumann said in a release. “We are fully committed to helping solve one of the biggest challenges of society – and that is how to feed a massively growing world population in an environmentally sustainable manner.”
Bayer sought the takeover to significantly strengthen its position as a “leading life science company in the world,” according to Baumann. He called healthcare and agriculture both attractive growth perspectives.
“I am convinced that Monsanto will flourish as part of Bayer,” he added.
In June, Monsanto announced the $975 million expansion of its Luling plant to make the chemical dicamba for its herbicide called Roundup Ready Xtend Crop System.
Preliminary work on the expansion started in 2015 with construction expected to start in January and continue through mid-2019. The company is holding a public information session on Sept. 29 from 4 to 7 p.m. at the Edward Dufresne Community Center.
As for the takeover, Grant said Monsanto and Bayer together “are going to be able to offer growers even better solutions faster.”
The two signed a definitive merger agreement today stating Bayer will acquire Monsanto, which has been approved by both companies’ Board of Directors, according to Monsanto.
According to Monsanto’s release, “This transaction brings together two different, but highly complementary businesses. The combined business will benefit from Monsanto’s leadership in Seeds & Traits and Climate Corporation platform along with Bayer’s broad Crop Protection product line across a comprehensive range of indications and crops in all key geographies. As a result, growers will benefit from a broad set of solutions to meet their current and future needs, including enhanced solutions in seeds and traits, digital agriculture, and crop protection.”
The combined agriculture business will have its global Seeds & Traits and North American commercial headquarters in St. Louis, Mi., its global Crop Protection and overall Crop Science headquarters in Monheim, Germany, and an important presence in Durham, N.C., as well as many other locations throughout the U.S. and around the world, according to Monsanto. The Digital Farming activities for the combined business will be based in San Francisco, Calif.
Be the first to comment