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Biotech / Medical : Monsanto Co. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JGoren who wrote (2528)	2/4/2000 8:18:00 PM
From: SteveR	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 2539

From CBS MarketWatch: Monsanto to Sell Tabletop Sweetener Unit February 4, 2000 10:16 am EST ST. LOUIS (Reuters) - Life sciences firm Monsanto Co. (MTC.N) said on Friday it agreed to sell its tabletop sweetener business, whose brands include NutraSweet and Equal, to an investment group for $570 million in cash. Monsanto, which had said last year it was looking for a buyer for the unit as part of a restructuring plan aimed at reducing debt, said it signed a definitive agreement with Tabletop Acquisition Corp., or TAC. TAC's institutional investors include Pegasus Capital Advisors and MSD Capital. Monsanto said proceeds from the sale of the tabletop sweetener business would be used to pay down debt and for other corporate purposes. All employees of the unit will be offered jobs with the new owners, Monsanto said. The company's shares were down 3/8 at 41-5/8 in early morning trading on the New York Stock Exchange. St. Louis-based Monsanto, which agreed in December to a merger with U.S.-Swedish drug group Pharmacia & Upjohn (PHU.ST)(PNU.N), incurred billions of dollars in debt after it acquired several seed companies in recent years. The purchases catapulted Monsanto into the No. 2 spot in the U.S. seed industry, but left it saddled with debt. William Fiala, an analyst with Edward Jones, said the $570 million price tag was within the $500 million to $700 million range that analysts had expected. "The fact that it took so long (to find a buyer) made some people doubt that they would get that much," he said, noting that Monsanto announced plans to sell the unit in July. "They were in a position that getting the deal done was almost as important as getting a good price." The deal does not include Monsanto's Neotame sweetener, which is still under U.S. Food and Drug Administration review. Monsanto has said Neotame is 7,000 to 8,000 times sweeter than sugar. NutraSweet, by comparison, is about 180 times as sweet as sugar. Monsanto is still looking for a buyer for its sweetener ingredient business, which includes Neotame, and for its biogums division. "As we stated last year, the tabletop sweetener business, as well as the sweetener ingredients and biogums businesses, are excellent revenue-generating businesses that are not in line with Monsanto's strategic direction," Gary Crittenden, Monsanto's chief financial officer, said in a statement. Monsanto has chosen agricultural products and pharmaceuticals as its two key markets. Its arthritis treatment Celebrex became the best-selling new drug in 1999, and its Roundup herbicide is among the top selling crop inputs.