Emperia has completed the process of inviting and screening bids at the first stage of the auction proceedings in an attempt to identify an investor for its retail business. The bidders include both industry and financial investors. When launching the auction process, the Management Board of Emperia set the minimum value of the transaction at PLN 900,000. The assessment of the bids submitted indicates that Emperia will receive at least that amount.
The deadline for submission of non-binding bids to Emperia expired on 26 September. The majority of a dozen or so entities which received the Information Memorandum submitted their bids. In recent days, the Management Board of Emperia, jointly with an investment advisor, KPMG Advisory, evaluated the submitted proposals and returned to the selected entities to request clarifications. On these basis, a short-list of several bidders invited to take part in the next stage of the process was developed.
“After the assessment of the non-binding bids, we maintain the view expressed by the Management Board as to the minimum price of the transaction: the retail business should attract an investor willing to pay at least PLN 900 million. The short-listed potential investors will be able to commence the due diligence as early as this week,” said Artur Kawa, Chairman of Management Board, Emperia Holding SA.
The next stage involves an investigation of the legal and financial condition of Emperia’s retail business by potential investors, based on the findings of which they will be able to draw up their binding bids. They will have time until the end of October to do so. The data will be disclosed by the Company in a virtual data room. The Sale Agreement will be executed with the selected investor by the end of the year.
Emperia announced the auction process aimed at attracting an investor for its retail business in late June. The transaction includes Stokrotka, Delima, Społem Tychy, and Maro Markety store chains holding the total of 233 outlets.
As the auction process moves forward, Emperia keeps on growing its retail business. The Company is constantly on the lookout for new outlet locations and continues to add further supermarkets to its chains. In the two first quarters of this year alone, 7 new Stokrotkas were launched, and as many as 20 locations are scheduled to open for business in 2011.
In the first half of 2011, the continued business of the Emperia Trading Group generated PLN 2.58 billion in sales revenues, up by 8.9 percent on the same period last year. EBITDA reached PLN 79.6 million, up by 6.4 percent, and net profit at PLN 28.7 million was down by 4.6 percent. In the same period, the company’s investment outlays were in excess of PLN 40.4 million.