Asian Paints acquires additional 25.72% stake in Berger International

NEW DELHI: Asian Paints International Ltd today acquired additional 25.72 per cent stake in Berger International Ltd and said it will make an open offer to fully acquire the Singapore-based company.

APIL, which already held 50.1 per cent stake in BIL, raised it to 75.82 per cent by buying shares for Singapore dollar (SD) 0.25 per scrip, totalling SD 6.68 million.

"APIL has also announced its intention to come out with a voluntary unconditional cash offer to acquire the balance 24.18 per cent shares of BIL with an intention to make BIL a wholly-owned subsidiary of APIL and delist from Singapore Exchange Securities Trading Ltd," APIL said in a BSE filing.

In a separate filing to the Singapore stock exchange, KPMG Corporate Finance Pte Ltd said on behalf of APIL that it has acquired 26,725,122 shares in BIL from Aegis Estates Ltd, representing approximately 25.72 per cent of the total number of the issued shares, at SD 0.25 per share.

"Consequently, the offeror intends to make the offer at the offer price to enable the minority shareholders to realise their investment in the shares at the same price at which the Aegis Stake was acquired," it added.

APIL believes that the delisting of BIL will provide greater flexibility to manage, develop and optimise the use of the management and capital resources and facilitate the implementation of any operational change, it said.

Asian Paints said it has no present intention to introduce any major changes to the businesses of Berger.