At the end of the acceptance period on 1 June, the acceptance rate for the tender offer from Engine Holding GmbH – the joint venture between Daimler AG and Rolls-Royce Holding plc – comes to 58.35 percent of shares in Tognum AG. Including transactions outside of the tender offer, the bidder has acquired a total of 59.87 percent of Tognum shares up to this cut-off date.
This exceeds the threshold of at least 30 percent of shares stipulated in the tender offer. Subject to the regulatory approvals that are still pending, Engine Holding GmbH’s tender offer to the shareholders of the Friedrichshafen engine manufacturer was thus successful. Since the 30 percent acceptance threshold required for the takeover offer is met, an additional acceptance period of two weeks is granted in accordance with German law. Therefore, remaining shareholders can tender their shares into the offer from June 7 to June 20, 24:00 hrs (CET).
In its increased offer, Engine Holding had offered shareholders in Tognum AG a cash price of EUR 26.00 per share. Shareholders who accept the offer thus receive a premium of some 41 percent on the last unaffected price of Tognum shares.
Volker Heuer, Chairman of the Executive Board and CEO of Tognum AG, welcomed the company’s new majority shareholder: “ With the acceptance of the offer by our shareholders, Tognum, Daimler and Rolls-Royce now embark on a highly promising shared future. Together with the two companies, we further strengthen our technological leadership in propulsion systems and distributed energy systems and develop our company into a platform for growth .”
“ We will continue to provide customers with our proven standard of service ,” Heuer adds. “ This will now be supplemented with access to new markets through and for our partners. In this way, we will boost our market presence notably in the BRIC states. Our customers will benefit from the attractive complementary strengths, technology and market access from the three world class companies. For our workforce, this opens up outstanding prospects for professional development .”
The Tognum Group’s locations worldwide are to be retained. Friedrichshafen remains the headquarters of the company as well as the research, development and production site for high-speed propulsion systems and energy systems. The move presents new cooperation opportunities for Tognum and Rolls-Royce in particular, because the two companies between them cover the entire spectrum of medium and high-speed diesel engines for complete propulsion systems. Moreover, the companies benefit from complementary additions to their energy product portfolios. As they offer different products in similar markets, this leads to significant opportunities in sales and after sales.
[mappress]
Source: Tognum, June 6, 2011;