The company's roots date back to 1914, when the revolutionary Dubbs thermal cracking process created the technological foundation for today's modern refining industry.

[citation needed] In the ensuing decades, UOP engineers generated thousands of patents, leading to important advances in process technology, profitability consultation, and equipment design.

[5][4] Most of the losses were incurred during lengthy legal battles with petroleum firms that were using technology patented by Dubbs.

This worried oil firms that were not part of the group and it helped prompt the Justice Department to begin an investigation of this arrangement as a possible violation of antitrust laws.

[citation needed] The oil firms placed the assets of UOP into a trust to support the American Chemical Society (ACS).

In 1959 UOP went public and the income from that sale still provides monies to ACS to administer grants to universities worldwide.

In 2005, what was now known as Honeywell acquired Union Carbide's stake in UOP, making it again a wholly owned subsidiary.

[7] The UOP Riverside research and development laboratory in McCook, Illinois was conceived in 1921 by Hiram J. Halle, the chief executive officer of Universal Oil Products (now simply UOP), as a focal point where the best and brightest scientists could create new products and provide scientific support for the oil refining industry.

Between 1921 and 1955, Riverside research resulted in 8,790 U.S. and foreign patents and provided the foundation on which UOP built its success.

[3] The company benefited immensely by the addition to its research staff of Professor Vladimir Ipatieff, famous Russian scientist known internationally for his work in high-pressure catalysis.

This process used very small amounts of platinum as a catalyst for the high yield of high-octane gasoline from petroleum-based feeds.

A valid analogy is to imagine a busy street with people walking in the same direction past great places to eat.