Suez faces growing takeover pressure

Veolia is accelerating its efforts to acquire rival Suez by offering to buy all of the latter’s shares for EUR 18 per share. Veolia says the only thing stopping the takeover is the Suez board.

The waste manager acquired Engie’s 29.9% stake in Suez in October and indicated a desire for a ‘voluntary takeover’ of the remaining shares. But these efforts have been rebuffed.

In a new media release, Veolia says it has ‘devoted the weeks since its acquisition … to making a number of attempts to renew its dialogue with Suez, both with the company’s chairman and with the members of its board of directors. Until now, the systematic response from Suez has been to turn down these approaches.’

Veolia’s chairman and ceo Antoine Frérot, says the company is convinced they will persuade the Suez board of’ the relevance of our proposal’.

‘For this reason, we wish to further clarify our timetable and to undertake to make our bid as soon as the board of directors issues a favourable opinion. In summary: the only thing preventing all Suez shareholders from benefiting from a public takeover bid at €18 per share is the opposition from the board of directors of Suez in its current form.’

Meanwhile, the UK waste management and recycling services provider Reconomy, which has made a series of acquisitions in recent years, is looking to the continent for the first time. The Shopshire-based company has signed an agreement to buy the Noventiz Group of Companies from German private equity firm Seafort Advisors. Noventiz provides packaging compliance services for commercial customers in Germany.

Ceo Paul Cox says it is the start of ‘an exciting new chapter’ for Reconomy as it looks to establish itself in the European and international marketplace. ‘Our vision is to add value to customers across the breadth of environmental services on a global scale and Noventiz will provide an opportunity to build on the success we’ve experienced with packaging compliance, using their great expertise and knowledge of the German market.’

Also in the UK, Viridor has sold its e-scrap division to Scottish firm Shore Recycling. In 2008, Viridor acquired Shore but now media reports indicate a new version of the Shore brand has been established. The new company is reported as saying it has no immediate plans to reopen an e-scrap recycling facility near Liverpool Viridor closed this summer.

Industry observers expect Viridor’s new owners KKR to dispose of the group’s recycling assets to concentrate on the energy-from-waste business