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CarrierGlobal Corp.,a makerofair
conditioners and freezer pods, began
trading as a standalone company on
April 3. It could have been a disaster:
Most of the world was locked down as
the pandemic raged, and the stock mar-
ketwasswingingbetweenspectacular
slumpsandwildgains.Butas 2020 ends,
Carrieris thebest-performing industrial
stock in the S&P 500—by a long shot.
Its shares have climbed more than
200% since the company separated from
longtime parent United Technologies
Corp. The split was part of a three-way breakupthatalso
married the company’s aerospace businesseswithdefense
contractor Raytheon Co. For years analystshadquestioned
why the air conditioning business and theOtisWorldwide
Corp. elevator unit needed to be underthesameroof
as divisions that sold jet engines and aircraftwheels.
Eventually, activist investors Dan Loeb andBillAckman
also backed a breakup, arguing that UnitedTechnologies’
myriad businesses would benefit from more-focusedman-
agement teams. That’s helped, but investorscouldn’thave
predictedthingslikeventilationandrefrigeratedtrailers
wouldhavesucha momentin2020.
Carrier,whichtracesitsrootsto1902,is creditedwith
inventingmodernairconditioning.Itsheatingandcool-
ingsystemshelpmaintaintheclimateinsidetheSistine
ChapelandtheGreatLibraryofAlexandria.Todaythese
samesystemshavebecomeanassetforhospitals,hotels,
andofficebuildingsinthefightagainstthecoronavirus,a largelyairbornepathogenthatpasses
mosteasily between people in poorly
ventilated spaces. No air conditioning
system can replace masks and social
distancing, but adjusting the controls to
allow for more outside air to flow into
buildings and cleaning or upgrading
filters can help prevent the virus from
spreading. Carrier’s portable OptiClean
machine can be used to scrub air or to
create pressure that keeps air from
moving between one room—say, an
office bathroom or a hospital room—
and another. Time magazine named it one of the best
inventions of 2020.
Carrier says it expects interest in improving indoor air
quality to endure even after the pandemic passes; it has
sized this new market at about $10 billion for the over-
all industry, including $165 million of opportunities the
company is already broaching with customers. In prepara-
tion for a vaccine, Carrier introduced mobile freezer pods
enabled with its Sensitech monitoring technology. It’s also
working with Amazon.com Inc.’s web services arm to con-
nectitscold-chainstorageoperationstothecloudanduse
thecollecteddatatoreducevaccinewaste.Todayabout
a quarterofvaccinesareneveradministeredbecauseof
breakdownsinlogistics,accordingtoCarrier.
Thisisallgoodnewsforhumanity, butit’sbeen
greatnewsforCarrier’sshareholders. <BW> �Sutherland
writes about deals and industrial companies for
ILLUSTRATION BY GEORGE WYLESOL Bloomberg OpinionBy Brooke Sutherland
Cold Air Makes Carrier a
Coronavirus Winner
◼ LAST THING
With Bloomberg Opinion