Two buyers pursue garment firm Pod
The Press, New Zealand
Listed fashion and garment firm Pod– linked to Christchurch businessman George Gould – has two potential buyers pursuing it.
A rival, LWR Manufacturing, is indicating it wants to make a takeover offer, and another group is seeking to buy one of Pod’s three business strands, Pod said yesterday.
LWR Manufacturing (LWR) is offering 50c a share, valuing the company at $22.53 million, with that price being seen as light by at least one significant shareholder in Pod.
The LWR offer is a battle of old against the new in many senses, with LWR having been around in different forms since 1904.
Gould, Pod’s chairman and cornerstone investor, is a fifth generation Cantabrian and associated with the Pyne Gould Guinness.
Pod sees the alternative offer to buy one of three subsidiaries – Designer Textiles International, Mollers Homewares and Michele Ann – as more positive although it is not naming which unit or the prospective buyer.
Pod’s shares yesterday closed up 3c at 47. The shares have traded in a 29c to 68c range over the last year, down from a peak of 124c in late 2004.
In recent times the high kiwi dollar has hindered the company, which has been increasingly moving into export markets.
LWR was yesterday not commenting beyond a statement issued through New Zealand Exchange (NZX) saying it “has an interest in making a takeover offer for all the shares in Pod Limited at a price of 50c an ordinary share, but that it has not been in a position to formulate a formal offer to date”.
At 5pm yesterday, Gould said Pod had yet to receive a formal notice from LWR.
LWR Manufacturing is part of the Lane Walker Rudkin Industries group structure, privately owned by Ken Anderson. Anderson was not available for comment yesterday.
A letter from LWR stated any takeover offer would be subject to a 90 per cent acceptance condition, and it intended to negotiate pre-bid agreements with significant shareholders, Pod said in a notice through the NZX.
Gould said he could not comment about his view on whether Pod should be sold in part or full, but there was more than one interested party. “There certainly is competition for the assets,” he said.
It was “early days” in a process that would involve the appointment of an independent adviser to look at the LWR offer if it was formalised.
“We’ll let shareholders know as soon as we’ve formed a view on it,” Gould said.
Pod chief executive Malcolm Walkinshaw yesterday said it had been a surprise to receive the original offer from LWR.
There had also been a separate unsolicited proposal for the sale of “one of the three main businesses in Pod” , Walkinshaw said.
The company had been working on the sale of subsidiary proposal.
“I think that’s a fairly positive situation …”
Gould, whose family investment vehicle Gould Holdings is the biggest single shareholder, said Pod would see bottom line profitability in the June 2014 year.
Walkinshaw said trading for Pod was solid and generally on target. “Generally trading’s held up, but the exchange rate … has gone against us.”
An ACC spokesman said LWR might need to up the indicated offer price. ACC is a stakeholder in the company. ACC could not comment in detail until it saw the formal offer. “At 50c, we won’t be interested in that sort of level … (We’d) be quite happy to continue owning the company below that level.”
Pod had significant Auckland property assets. “If you crunch through some numbers you can get to 50c of value very quickly … it’s almost like a provisional level they’re looking at launching an offer,” the ACC spokesman said.
