Tuesday 22nd December 2020
Agreement with Elliot
Vodafone takes over Kabel Deutschland entirely
For years, Vodafone argued with some shareholders of Kabel Deutschland about the purchase price. The shareholders consider the offer to be far too low. However, courts consider only a small surcharge to be justified. Now all sides come to an agreement.
After years of litigation about the takeover of Kabel Deutschland, Vodafone can now draw a line. The British mobile phone company announced that it had reached an agreement with major shareholder Elliott and other minority shareholders to take over their block of shares.
Vodafone is offering outstanding shareholders EUR 103 per share, which is over EUR 2 billion. The minority shareholders like Elliott, D.E. Shaw and UBS O'Connor LLC, which together hold 17 percent, had already accepted the offer and agreed not to take any further legal action.
In autumn 2013, Vodafone acquired around 77 percent of Germany's largest cable network operator for 7.7 billion euros. Years of legal dispute with major shareholder Elliott followed. The hedge fund carried out a special audit before the Munich Regional Court in mid-2016.
The investor, who holds 14 percent of Kabel Deutschland, was of the opinion that the management of Kabel Deutschland had been satisfied with a takeover offer from Vodafone that was too low. Instead of the € 84.50 per share offered by the mobile phone company, Elliott asked € 225 to € 275. At the end of 2014, however, a special auditor considered 104 euros appropriate. Another verdict at the end of 2019 also found the offer "appropriate."
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