December 20 (SeeNews) - Switzerland-based Batagon International signed an agreement for the acquisition of Serbian insolvent car battery maker Fabrika Akumulatora Sombor (FAS) for 7.35 million euro ($8.7 million), Belgrade-based media reported.
The acquisition offer of Batagon was approved earlier this month by the International Finance Corporation (IFC), Serbian brokerage Mediolanum Invest and a representative of the employees of FAS, which together have a majority in the company's board of creditors, news portal SoInfo quoted the insolvency administrator of the car battery maker, Predrag Ljubovic, as saying on Tuesday.
You can subscribe to our M&A newsletter here
"The company should start with 450-500 workers, and their number should later rise to 800, as much as it was in the past. FAS would mainly produce [car batteries] for the markets of Russia, Germany, Switzerland, Italy and France," SoInfo quoted Batagon's representative in the talks, Dalibor Matic, as saying earlier in December.
Last month, three members of the creditors' board of FAS rejected an improved 7 million euro acquisition offer made by Batagon. The creditors of FAS had earlier rejected three offers made by Batagon International for the assets of the insolvent company. Batagon International originally offered 3 million euro for FAS in July and then sweetened their bid to 4 million euro. In August, the creditors rejected a 5.05 million euro offer and Batagon International increased the price to 6 million euro.
In May 2014, the Serbian government agreed to sell FAS to Greek company DEM Hellas owned by entrepreneur Eftimios Karanasios. However, DEM Hellas did not meet its contractual obligations and the Serbian government called a new tender for the sale of FAS in October 2016. The tender attracted no bids.
($ = 0.8429 euro)