DAK Americas Acquisition of Eastman Chemical and Wellman Inc.

Compass Lexecon assisted with the successful regulatory approval of DAK Americas’ acquisitions of two North American PET businesses. DAK Americas, a wholly owned subsidiary of Alfa S.A.B. de C.V. of Monterrey Mexico, acquired Wellman, Inc.’s PET business and Eastman Chemical’s PET, PTA and related performance polymers businesses. Both transactions were cleared by the FTC without a request for additional information. We developed evidence of the global trade in various chemical inputs and final products and analyzed the speed of trade flows by examining the market dynamics following Hurricane Katrina, which affected the supply of key inputs for PET production. Professor Dennis Carlton and Rick Flyer headed the Compass Lexecon team, which included Colleen Loughlin, Todd Kendall and Dan Stone. We were retained by Steve Newborn at Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, and worked with his team that included Jonathan Sickler and Jeff White.