Companies

Honeywell’s Future: Bigger or Smaller?

The conglomerate, with its recent underperformance, faces calls from some investors to stop acquisitions and start splitting up into smaller companies.
Honeywell’s Future: Bigger or Smaller?
An aircraft engine is tested at Honeywell Aerospace in Phoenix on Sept. 6, 2016. Alwyn Scott/Reuters
Panos Mourdoukoutas
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Honeywell has recently been caught between two visions of its future: one held by activist investor Elliott Investment Management, Inc., which wants it smaller and split into two parts, and another by management, which wants the company to become bigger through acquisitions.

Honeywell is a conglomerate with four segments: aerospace, industrial automation, building automation, and energy and sustainability solutions. As of 2023, the aerospace segment was the largest, accounting for $13.6 billion in sales out of a company-wide total of $36.7 billion. Industrial automation accounted for $10.8 billion, and the other two divisions accounted for roughly $6 billion each.
Panos Mourdoukoutas
Panos Mourdoukoutas
Author
Panos Mourdoukoutas is a professor of economics at Long Island University in New York City. He also teaches security analysis at Columbia University. He’s been published in professional journals and magazines, including Forbes, Investopedia, Barron's, IBT, and Journal of Financial Research. He’s also the author of many books, including “Business Strategy in a Semiglobal Economy” and “China's Challenge.”