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May. 1 (NBD) -- U.S.-based home appliance maker Whirlpool Corp. agreed to sell its Embraco compressor business to Japanese electric motor manufacturer Nidec Corp. for 1.08 billion U.S. dollars in cash.

The U.S. company said that the sale is consistent with its focus on its consumer-facing business.

It also agreed to buy back up to 1 billion U.S. dollars of shares in the form of a modified Dutch Auction tender offer at an anticipated price of 150-170 U.S. dollars per share and the offer is expected to launch on 26 April.

The deal won't include Embraco's Italy facility and the transaction is not expected to have a material impact on its 2018 financial results, Whirlpool noted.

Headquartered in Brazil, compressor and cooling solution manufacturer Embraco has been a Whirlpool majority-owned business unit since 1997. It has about 11,000 employees across 8 plants in Brazil, Italy, China, Slovakia and Mexico. Whirlpool thus has a complete industry chain with core technology.

The total price of Embraco business is lower than expected. Whirlpool is believed to make adjustments of its strategy in the global market.

In recent years, the American firm saw its home appliance business shrinking, as other makers from Asian countries such as China and Japan emerged. According to the latest financial results released by Whirlpool, the GAAP net earnings of the company in the first quarter of 2018 registered 94 million U.S. dollars, declining 38.56 percent year on year. While net sales stood at 4.91 billion U.S. dollars, presenting a year-on-year rise of 2.6 percent.

However, Chinese appliance manufacturer Midea Group and Qingdao Haier reported revenue of 70.3 bililon yuan (11.1 billion U.S. dollars) and 42.6 billion yuan (6.7 billion U.S. dollars) respectively in the same period.

In 2016, the U.S. firm fell to fourth spot in the raking of retail sales of global home appliance brands, after China-based Haier, Korea's LG and Samsung, presenting a market share of 4.7 percent in the global home appliance market, according to data from research institution Euromonitor.

In China, the U.S.-based company only gained limited market share in the white appliance market. The relatively low quality and poor technique of Whirlpool's products led to the shrinking market shares of the company in the Chinese market, industry watcher Liang Zhenpeng explained.

But in the U.S. market, Whirlpool expects to maintain its market share through the new tariff policy.

On 22 January, the U.S. President Trump has approved to impose protective tariff on imported washing machines.

Due to the injury to the U.S. manufacturers caused by those imports, the country will charge a 20 percent tariff on the first 1.2 million imported washing machines and 50 percent for the rest of the imports in the first year since the launch of the new rules.

Email: zhanglingxiao@nbd.com.cn