Enodis agrees £1.03bn ITW offer
Enodis, which last month accepted an offer by Manitowoc, today agreed to be taken over by Illinois Tool Works (ITW) for £1.03bn.
Under the terms of the offer, shareholders will receive 280p in cash for each share, a 15% premium to Wednesday's 243.5p closing price.
In addition, Enodis, which makes restaurant equipments for McDonalds, will pay a dividend of 2p per share in lieu of an interim dividend in respect of the financial year ending 30 September 2008.
Enodis agreed last month to be taken over by Manitowoc for around £945m. The US firm, which makes ice-cream fridges, offered to pay 258p per share. Manitowoc said today that it is considering its position and will make a further announcement in due course.
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Shares in the group rallied 17% to 286.50p following today's news, suggesting that investors are hoping that a bidding war will break out between ITW and Manitowoc.
"Having considered carefully all aspects of the offer from ITW, including transaction certainty, from an anti-trust perspective, and the higher price which this offer provides, the Enodis directors have decided unanimously to recommend the offer from ITW to shareholders," said Enodis' chairman Peter Brooks.
David B. Speer, chairman and chief executive of ITW, said he believes that the "combination of ITW Food Equipment and Enodis will create an expanded global food equipment platform with very complementary strategic, operational and geographical growth positions."
"The collective businesses will have a significantly enhanced product portfolio in addition to greater scale to compete even more effectively and successfully in the global food equipment industry," he added.
