NOTE 19. Business Segments and Geographic Information

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3M’s businesses are organized, managed and internally grouped into segments based on differences in markets, products, technologies and services. 3M manages its operations in four business segments: Safety and Industrial; Transportation and Electronics; Health Care; and Consumer. 3M’s four business segments bring together common or related 3M technologies, enhancing the development of innovative products and services and providing for efficient sharing of business resources. Transactions among reportable segments are recorded at cost. 3M is an integrated enterprise characterized by substantial intersegment cooperation, cost allocations and inventory transfers. Therefore, management does not represent that these segments, if operated independently, would report the operating income information shown.

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Effective in the second quarter of 2020, the measure of segment operating performance used by 3M’s chief operating decision maker (CODM) changed and, as a result, 3M’s disclosed measure of segment profit/loss (business segment operating income) has been updated for all periods presented. The change to business segment operating income aligns with the update to how the CODM assesses performance and allocates resources for the Company’s business segments.

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3M discloses business segment operating income as its measure of segment profit/loss, reconciled to both total 3M operating income and income before taxes. Business segment operating income includes dual credit for certain related operating income (as described below in “Elimination of Dual Credit”). Business segment operating income excludes certain expenses and income that are not allocated to business segments (as described below in “Corporate and Unallocated”). Additionally, the following special items are excluded from business segment operating income and, instead, are included within Corporate and Unallocated: significant litigation-related charges/benefits, gain/loss on sale of businesses (see Note 3), and divestiture-related restructuring actions (see Note 5).

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In addition, effective in the first quarter of 2020, in a continuing effort to improve the alignment of its businesses around customers and markets, the Company made the following changes:

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Continued alignment of customer account activity

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Additional actions impacting product line alignments

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The financial information presented herein reflects the impact of the preceding business segment reporting changes for all periods presented.

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Business Segment Products

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Business Segment Information

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Business Segment Information

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Assets subject to attribution to business segments largely include accounts receivable; inventories; property, plant and equipment; goodwill; intangible assets; and certain limited other assets. All other items are reflected in Corporate and Unallocated. Accounts receivable and inventory are attributed based on underlying sales or activity. Property, plant and equipment are attributed to a particular business segment based on that item’s primary user while certain items such as corporate-shared headquarters/administrative centers, laboratories, distribution centers and enterprise software systems are reflected in Corporate and Unallocated. Intangible assets and goodwill are largely directly associated with a particular reporting unit and attributed on that basis. Business segment depreciation reflected above is based on the underlying usage of assets (while the particular asset itself may be entirely reflected within a different business segment’s asset balance as its primary user). This depreciation also includes allocated depreciation associated with a number of the assets reflected in Corporate and Unallocated as described above.

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During 2020, information relative to business segment depreciation and assets reviewed by 3M’s CODM changed. The change did not impact each segment’s operating income, but did change the separate summarization of depreciation by segment in CODM information. Depreciation previously was summarized based generally on depreciation of a particular asset being associated entirely

with a single reporting unit, as opposed to an estimate of underlying asset usage. New CODM reporting of depreciation is as described above. With respect to assets in CODM reporting, previously certain assets used by multiple segments were “split” in terms of determining the balances associated with each business segment (new reporting aligns the entire asset to a single primary user), certain shared manufacturing assets were retained in Corporate and Unallocated, and a number of other assets were allocated to the business segments. The impact of these changes has been reflected in the above table for all periods presented.

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Corporate and Unallocated

Corporate and unallocated operating income includes a variety of miscellaneous items, such as corporate investment gains and losses, certain derivative gains and losses, certain insurance-related gains and losses, certain litigation and environmental expenses, corporate restructuring charges and certain under- or over-absorbed costs (e.g. pension, stock-based compensation) that the Company may choose not to allocate directly to its business segments and is disclosed as ‘other corporate expense-net”. Additionally, Corporate and Unallocated includes special items such as significant litigation-related charges/benefits, gain/loss on sale of businesses (see Note 3), and divestiture-related restructuring costs (see Note 5). Corporate and Unallocated also includes sales, costs, and income from contract manufacturing, transition services and other arrangements with the acquirer of all of the Communication Markets Division following its 2018 divestiture through 2019 and the acquirer of the former drug delivery business following its 2020 divestiture. Because this category includes a variety of miscellaneous items, it is subject to fluctuation on a quarterly and annual basis.

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Elimination of Dual Credit

3M business segment reporting measures include dual credit to business segments for certain sales and related operating income. Management evaluates each of its four business segments based on net sales and operating income performance, including dual credit reporting to further incentivize sales growth. As a result, 3M reflects additional (“dual”) credit to another business segment when the customer account activity (“sales district”) with respect to the particular product sold to the external customer is provided by a different business segment. This additional dual credit is largely reflected at the division level. For example, privacy screen protection products are primarily sold by the Display Materials and Systems Division within the Transportation and Electronics business segment; however, certain sales districts within the Consumer business segment provide the customer account activity for sales of the product to particular customers. In this example, the non-primary selling segment (Consumer) would also receive credit for the associated net sales initiated through its sales district and the related approximate operating income. The assigned operating income related to dual credit activity may differ from operating income that would result from actual costs associated with such sales. The offset to the dual credit business segment reporting is reflected as a reconciling item entitled “Elimination of Dual Credit,” such that sales and operating income in total are unchanged.

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Geographic Information

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Geographic area information is used by the Company as a secondary performance measure to manage its businesses. Export sales and certain income and expense items are generally reported within the geographic area where the final sales to 3M customers are made. Refer to Note 2 for geographic net sales.

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United States net property, plant and equipment (PP&E) was $5,358 and $5,442 million at December 31, 2020 and 2019, respectively. China/Hong Kong net property, plant and equipment (PP&E) was $583 million and $553 million at December 31, 2020 and 2019, respectively.