Monsanto and Syngenta talking about a merger

May 04, 2015

Combining the two would create a titan in ag-circles

If you’re a baseball fan, imagine if the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox, two of the most lucrative organizations in baseball who compete with one another on every level, joined forces.

Monsanto Syngenta

A similar situation looks like it could unfold in the agricultural world.

American seed and crop chemical giant Monsanto has approached Swiss chemical giant, Syngenta, about a merger that, if came to fruition would have more than $30 billion US in revenue.

If the deal came to pass, the company would be the largest seed and chemical company in the world and would compete with Bayer AG, BASF SE, DuPont Co. and Dow Chemical Co.

There are some hurdles, such as antitrust, that could impact the deal. The company would almost monopolize the seed markets so as a result, Monsanto’s offer may include a sale of some of the parts of the combined business venture.

This is the second time Monsanto has approached Syngenta about a possible merger.

Last year, Monsanto investigated a $34 billion takeover of Syngenta that, had the deal gone through, would have seen Monsanto move their offices to Switzerland.

Monsanto and Syngenta, briefly:

	Monsanto	Syngenta
Headquarters	St. Louis, Missouri, USA	Basel, Switzerland
Price per stock share as of Monday, May 4^th, 2015	$116.54	$72.55
Sales (2014)	$15.43 billion	$14.71 billion
Founded	1901	1999

Join the conversation and tell us your thoughts on the possibility of a merger between Monsanto and Syngenta. Would it change the way you ran your farm operation?

Video: LALEXPERT: Sclerotinia cycle and prophylactic methods

White rot, also known as sclerotinia, is a common agricultural fungal disease caused by various virulent species of Sclerotinia. It initially affects the root system (mycelium) before spreading to the aerial parts through the dissemination of spores.

Sclerotinia is undoubtedly a disease of major economic importance, and very damaging in the event of a heavy attack.

All these attacks come from the primary inoculum stored in the soil: sclerotia. These forms of resistance can survive in the soil for over 10 years, maintaining constant contamination of susceptible host crops, causing symptoms on the crop and replenishing the soil inoculum with new sclerotia.