Pharmaceutical company Roche has offered €1.2 billion 1.6 billion Swiss francs for Disetronic, the world's number two maker of insulin pumps for those with diabetes.
Roche is offering 670 Swiss francs per share in cash and two Roche non-voting shares for Disetronic's 1.9 million Swiss francs' worth of outstanding shares.
Unusually, Roche is paying for part of Disetronic with non-voting shares. The move will be seen as a sign that Roche still has considerable financial flexibility to do deals despite Novartis's unwelcome presence on its share register, and its own oft-criticised two-tier voting structure that allows the Roche families to keep control while owning only 9.2 per cent of the capital.
The net cost of Roche's agreed bid for Disetronic Holding will be around 1.2 billion Swiss francs, company spokesman Mr Bashi Duerr said.
The 400 million Swiss francs difference between the gross and net cost of the bid is because Roche is bidding for all of Disetronic, but it will only retain its largest division, infusion systems.
Disetronic's other division, injection systems, will then be sold to Disetronic's chairman and founder Mr Willy Michel, Mr Duerr said.
The bid, which is conditional on an 80 per cent acceptance rate, is set to be completed in the first half of 2003, Mr Duerr said. It is subject to the usual regulatory approvals in both Europe and the United States, he added.
AFP