The Dow Chemical Company closes sale of MEGlobal to EQUATE

On December 23, 2015, The Dow Chemical Company (Dow) completed the sale of its ownership interest in MEGlobal to EQUATE Petrochemical Company K.S.C. (EQUATE) and has received $1.5 billion in pre-tax proceeds.

Dow had previously announced its intent to optimize its ownership in its Kuwaiti Joint Ventures and the closure of this transaction represents progress toward delivering this commitment.

The majority of MEGlobal’s value consists of Canadian assets that are owned by MEGlobal Canada Inc.

MEGlobal is a joint venture between Dow and Petrochemical Industries Company (PIC) of Kuwait. Through its ownership interest in EQUATE, Dow retains a 42.5 per cent ownership stake in MEGlobal.

EQUATE Petrochemical Company K.S.C is headquartered in Kuwait, is the operator of an integrated world-scale manufacturing facility producing more than 5 million tons annually of high-quality petrochemical products.

Shearman & Sterling LLP acted as counsel to Dow with a team led by George Casey and Heiko Schiwek (M&A) in New York, and included partners Douglas McFadyen (tax), Doreen Lilienfeld (compensation, governance & ERISA), Joshua Thompson (finance), Marwan Elaraby and Robert Nelson (project development & finance), Matthew Powell (M&A), Jordan Altman (intellectual property transactions), Jason Pratt (real estate), Harald Halbhuber and Richard Alsop and Richard Alsop (capital markets); along with associates Greg Gewirtz and Samara Thomas (M&A), Monica Lamb and Helen Cook (project development & finance), Maroun El-Hachem, Victor Nilsson, Dillon Smith, Jack Melamed and Alex Rosenthal (corporate), Yoon-Jee Kim and Drew Valentine (capital markets), Mark Pereira (intellectual property transactions/M&A), Christine Wright (finance), Tasha Matharu (compensation, governance & ERISA) and Yanlin Liu and Vita Zhu (international associates).

McCarthy Tétrault LLP acted as Canadian corporate and competition law counsel to Dow with a team that was led by Rick Pawluk (corporate) and included Scott Bergen and Adrian Camara (corporate); Oliver Borgers and Jonathan Bitran (competition); and TJ Kang (tax). Steve Suarez of Borden Ladner Gervais LLP acted as Canadian tax counsel to Dow.

Latham & Watkins LLP acted as lead legal counsel to EQUATE on both the acquisition and the acquisition financing. The deal team was led by Dan Maze (finance) and included Matthew Hope, William Lam and Charlotte Hagan and Simon Tysoe (corporate) and Saad Mian, Cynthia Ip and Andrew Clark (corporate).

Loyens Loeff acted as Dutch counsel to EQUATE; Stikeman Elliott LLP and Stewart McKelvey acted as Canadian counsel to EQUATE. The International Counsel Bureau acted as Kuwaiti counsel for EQUATE.