GE to spin off healthcare unit, divest Baker Hughes stake

General Electric Co said on Tuesday it will spin off its healthcare business and divest its stake in oil-services company Baker Hughes, leaving the oncesprawling conglomerate focused on jet engines, power plants and renewable energy.

The changes are designed to reward battered shareholders and to strengthen GE's balance sheet by reducing debt, building up cash and further shrinking GE Capital, the company said.

Shareholders will receive 80 percent of the value of GE Healthcare as a tax-free distribution of shares.

GE shares jumped 6.4 per cent to $13.57 in early trading.

The 126-year-old company, which was once the most valuable US corporation, will spin off the profitable healthcare unit over the next 12 to 18 months, and sell its Baker Hughes stake over two to three years.

GE, whose stock has fallen more than 50 per cent in the last 12 months, said it would keep its annual 48 cents-per-share dividend until the healthcare spinoff is completed.

The moves, which end a yearlong strategic review, mirror changes that Wall Street analysts had called for a year ago. They come as GE is replaced in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the iconic stock index that GE was a founding member of in 1896.

With these finishing touches, GE said its plan to divest $20 billion in assets “is substantially complete,” leaving a “simpler and stronger” company with plans to boost its growth, operating profits and shareholder returns. “We are aggressively driving forward as an aviation, power and renewable energy company — three highly complementary businesses poised for future growth,” CEO John Flannery said in a statement.

The remaining businesses “share similar technologies and industrial markets, in contrast to limited synergies that exist with GE Healthcare,” Fitch analyst Eric Ause said in a note.

Shareholders will get 80 per cent of the value of GE Healthcare as a tax-free distribution of shares