Following a month long period of deliberation, Norway’s Marine Harvest has announced that its offer to acquire all outstanding shares of Poland’s leading smoked salmon processor, Morpol, has been accepted.
Marine Harvest will acquire 64,729,810 shares in total, taking its Morpol shares up to 146,261,515 – 87.1% of the share capital of the company.
But there may be additional acceptances not registered yet, meaning that Marine Harvest’s ownership in Morpol could increase further still.
Settlement in the shares will be made next month and Marine Harvest will not have any voting rights in its Morpol shares until the transaction has been approved by the EU Commission and the Ukrainian competition authorities.
Marine Harvest revealed its intention to acquire more shares in Morpol back in December last year. The company said that the reason behind the acquisition was to better cash in on the sale of smoked salmon products in the German market.
Alf-Helge Aarskog, CEO, Marine Harvest, said at the time: “Morpol will give our innovation and product development a strong boost. A combined Morpol and Marine Harvest can develop even more innovative and delicious seafood products for the consumer market.”
Morpol has a presence in all main markets for salmon with sales offices in a number of countries, including Japan and USA. The company has processing and distribution facilities in Poland, France, UK and Germany.
