Lenovo Group Ltd (聯想), China’s biggest PC maker, offered to buy control of Germany’s Medion AG for 466 million euros (US$672 million) in its biggest acquisition since the purchase of IBM’s PC business more than six years ago.
Lenovo will buy a 37 percent stake from chairman Gerd Brachmann for 231 million euros, or 13 euros a share, and plans to extend the offer to remaining shareholders, the Chinese company said in a statement yesterday.
That’s 18 percent higher than the German PC maker’s last close. Brachmann plans to keep an 18 percent stake, it said.
Lenovo chief executive Yang Yuanqing (楊元慶) said the Chinese company was interested in making more acquisitions.
The deal, which follows plans to form a venture with Japan’s NEC Corp, would help the maker of Thinkpad laptops expand its distribution network in Europe and boost its share of the global PC market against those of Hewlett-Packard Co (HP), Dell Inc and Acer Inc (宏碁).
HP accounted for 17.6 percent of the global PC market last quarter, declining from 18 percent a year earlier, according to research company Gartner Inc.
Lenovo, the fourth biggest, increased its market share to 9.7 percent from 8.2 percent, while Taipei-based Acer dropped to 12.9 percent from 14.6 percent, Gartner said.
The purchase will help Lenovo double its market share in Germany to 14 percent, the company statement said.
Medion would complement Lenovo’s west European business because of its strengths in the consumer retail market and distribution channels, it said.
Lenovo last week reported that fourth-quarter profit tripled, beating analysts’ estimates, after increasing sales to businesses in the US and Europe.
The Chinese company is stepping up a challenge to Apple Inc by offering smartphones and tablet devices and plans to enter the game-console market in the second half of the year.
Medion, based in Essen, supplies home-entertainment equipment and PCs to Aldi, Europe’s biggest discount retailer. The company’s profit last year increased by a third to 18.9 million euros, as sales climbed 16 percent. About three quarters of its revenue comes from Germany.
The US dollar was trading at NT$29.7 at 10am today on the Taipei Foreign Exchange, as the New Taiwan dollar gained NT$1.364 from the previous close last week. The NT dollar continued to rise today, after surging 3.07 percent on Friday. After opening at NT$30.91, the NT dollar gained more than NT$1 in just 15 minutes, briefly passing the NT$30 mark. Before the US Department of the Treasury's semi-annual currency report came out, expectations that the NT dollar would keep rising were already building. The NT dollar on Friday closed at NT$31.064, up by NT$0.953 — a 3.07 percent single-day gain. Today,
‘SHORT TERM’: The local currency would likely remain strong in the near term, driven by anticipated US trade pressure, capital inflows and expectations of a US Fed rate cut The US dollar is expected to fall below NT$30 in the near term, as traders anticipate increased pressure from Washington for Taiwan to allow the New Taiwan dollar to appreciate, Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行) chief economist Lin Chi-chao (林啟超) said. Following a sharp drop in the greenback against the NT dollar on Friday, Lin told the Central News Agency that the local currency is likely to remain strong in the short term, driven in part by market psychology surrounding anticipated US policy pressure. On Friday, the US dollar fell NT$0.953, or 3.07 percent, closing at NT$31.064 — its lowest level since Jan.
The New Taiwan dollar and Taiwanese stocks surged on signs that trade tensions between the world’s top two economies might start easing and as US tech earnings boosted the outlook of the nation’s semiconductor exports. The NT dollar strengthened as much as 3.8 percent versus the US dollar to 30.815, the biggest intraday gain since January 2011, closing at NT$31.064. The benchmark TAIEX jumped 2.73 percent to outperform the region’s equity gauges. Outlook for global trade improved after China said it is assessing possible trade talks with the US, providing a boost for the nation’s currency and shares. As the NT dollar
PRESSURE EXPECTED: The appreciation of the NT dollar reflected expectations that Washington would press Taiwan to boost its currency against the US dollar, dealers said Taiwan’s export-oriented semiconductor and auto part manufacturers are expecting their margins to be affected by large foreign exchange losses as the New Taiwan dollar continued to appreciate sharply against the US dollar yesterday. Among major semiconductor manufacturers, ASE Technology Holding Co (日月光), the world’s largest integrated circuit (IC) packaging and testing services provider, said that whenever the NT dollar rises NT$1 against the greenback, its gross margin is cut by about 1.5 percent. The NT dollar traded as strong as NT$29.59 per US dollar before trimming gains to close NT$0.919, or 2.96 percent, higher at NT$30.145 yesterday in Taipei trading
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