Brooke Sutherland, Columnist

Emerson Electric's CEO Can Still Rewrite His Legacy

The industrial conglomerate would be overreaching with this too big, too late takeover.

November 1, 2017 at 12:03 PM UTC

Brooke Sutherland is Bloomberg News' Boston bureau chief and writes the Industrial Strength Newsletter. She was previously a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering deals and industrial companies and an M&A reporter for Bloomberg News.

1509541696_pic — Photographer: F. Carter Smith/Bloomberg

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Emerson Electric Co. is better off transforming itself with a breakup than overreaching with a $27 billion bid for a competitor.

The $41 billion maker of automation and processing technology made a series of offers for Rockwell Automation Inc., eventually working itself up to a cash-and-stock bid this month of about $215 a share. That proposal -- a mere 15 percent premium to Rockwell Automation's unaffected price on Monday -- was deservedly rejected. Now that Emerson's bid is public, it opens the door for other suitors to step in. Emerson itself is unlikely to emerge victorious in any bidding war that ensues.