Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yup. Seems like an increasingly common move by businesses. AMD did this with global foundries, for example.
Im not following the surprise or maybe incredulity of this sentiment. It's normal and healthy for businesses to shed poor performers and merge to create synergies. The food majors went through this in the 2010s and nobody was crying or implicating malfeasance. The market should be reacting, that's what makes it useful.
The issue with spinning off losers and acquiring winners is the prioritization of short-term gains over long term gains. Further, I dispute that it's motivated by "the market" and not the gambling habits of corporate leaders.
Take, for example, HP's purchase of Palm for 1 billion dollars. But then a few months later, they let go of basically the entire palm staff. Then they created their webos tablet, then they killed it just a few months after launch. Then they let webos linger until finally selling rights to it to LG of all places.
You certainly can argue "this is just the market being efficient" but was it? Or was it overpaid C level individuals making big bets, failing, and punishing their employees for their incompetence?