Difficult Merger
The Big Deal between Samsung and Hanwha is expected to be completed in the petrochemical sector first.
The Samsung Group’s petrochemical subsidiaries, Samsung General Chemicals and Samsung Total Petrochemicals, will be renamed and launched as Hanwha Group subsidiaries as early as next month.
According to industry sources on April 27, Samsung General Chemicals and Samsung Total Petrochemicals will hold extraordinary shareholders meetings and board meetings on April 30. The agenda of the extraordinary shareholders meetings will be the change of companiy names and the approval of registered executives.
The Samsung Group struck a big deal with Hanwha Group and sold four of its affiliate companies to Hanwha for 1.9 trillion won (US$1.77 billion) in November last year. The four companies are Samsung General Chemicals and Samsung Total Petrochemicals in its petrochemical sector, and Samsung Techwin and Samsung Thales in its defense sector. When Samsung General Chemicals and Samsung Total Petrochemicals are handed over to Hanwha Group, getting approval in the extraordinary shareholders meetings, the Big Deal between the two groups will be half completed five months. The disposal procedure of the two subsidiaries in the petrochemical sector has been going relatively well compared to the other two in the defense sector.
Samsung General Chemicals has 350 executives and employees, while Samsung Total Petrochemicals has 1,500 of them. As of 2013, Samsung General Chemicals and Samsung Total Petrochemicals posted 2.36 trillion won (US$2.2 billion) and 7.85 trillion won (US$7.31 billion) in sales, respectively. Samsung subsidiaries has shares of Samsung General Chemicals - Samsung C&T with 37.28 percent, Samsung Techwin with 22.73 percent, Samsung SDI with 13.09 percent, and Samsung Electro-Mechanics with 9 percent. In Samsung Total Petrochemicals, Samsung General Chemicals and Total S.A. of France each own half of its shares.