Mannesmann to unveil early demerger - FT
LONDON, Nov 22 (Reuters) - Germany's Mannesmann AG could announce as soon as Monday plans for an early spin-off of its engineering and automotive businesses as it steps up its defence against a hostile bid from Vodafone AirTouch Plc(quote from Yahoo! UK & Ireland: VOD.L), the Financial Times said.
The company, which on Friday rejected a fresh 124 billion euro ($127.7 billion) offer from the UK cellphone giant, is also likely to announce that the tax bill resulting from its demerger proposals would be significantly less than the 2-2.5 billion euro previously envisaged, the FT said.
The flotation of Mannesmann's automotive and engineering divisions, announced in September, had originally been scheduled for early 2001. However, after agreement by Mannesmann's supervisory board on Friday, the timetable will be accelerated, the FT said.
It said Mannesmann had received approaches from Siemens , Continental and Thyssen Krupp about a trade sale of its automotive businesses -- but such a move was not thought to be under consideration.
Separately, a report in The Independent newspaper said Vodafone's Chief Executive Chris Gent had flown into Germany on Sunday to begin an intensive three-day lobbying campaign to win backing for its offer, which has already made corporate history as the world's largest hostile takeover bid.
No one at Vodafone was immediately available for comment |
