Knorr-Bremse first announced the deal in September 2016; however, nine months later, in June 2017, the EU Commission told it that it was planning to start a competition investigation about the deal. The day after, the Haldex board withdrew its support for the offer, although in an August meeting Haldex shareholders voted in favour of the deal, arguing for extending the offer period to accommodate the investigation. That was followed by news in September that the Swedish Securities Council, an organisation delegated by the Swedish government to regulate public takeover offers on the Swedish stock market, would not permit the extension.
Klaus Deller, chairman of the executive board of Knorr-Bremse AG, said: “We made an attractive offer, had convincing arguments and strong support by shareholders. We are convinced that the proposed combination would have been in the best interest of both companies as well as the shareholders of Haldex. Our approach was always, for sure, a friendly takeover. All our attempts to reach out to Haldex have, however, been rejected and the board blocks [actions] to jointly continue and create a new driving force in the commercial vehicle sector.”
He continued: ““It is thus a consequent step to withdraw the offer and move on. The combination of Haldex and Knorr-Bremse would have been our preferred option which was clearly backed by the shareholders of Haldex. However, we will now pursue alternatives.”
Haldex has also released a statement. Chairman of the board Jörgen Durban said: “We can finally put this public offer behind us and release the resources working on assisting the authorities with information. Ever since the end of June, when we received a very clear message from the authorities, we have known that there were no real possibilities for a deal. We will continue to build a stronger, competitive Haldex with customers, employees and shareholders in focus.
He added: “It’s pleasing to see that we have emerged stronger from this process on many levels. Our employees have shown an outstanding willingness to fight for Haldex in the market. In addition, we have received interesting inquiries from new prospective customers who are willing to work with us as soon as the bid has disappeared. Our focus now is to secure a number of long-term customer contracts that we were unable to sign during the bidding period and to work on a long-term, stable ownership structure.”