French giant confident it can secure British Energy shares

Published on Monday 8 December 2008 20:28

FRENCH energy company Electricite de France (EDF) has increased its stake in British Energy to 88.7 per cent following its public takeover offer.

The figure falls just short of the crucial 90 per cent needed by EDF to force the remaining shareholders to sell out to it to complete the takeover.

EDF yesterday disclosed that the offer period, which ended on Friday, is to be reopened with a new deadline of 5 January.

The 12 billion takeover, which is being carried out by EDF subsidiary Lake Acquisitions, will result in the East Kilbride-headquartered company being taken into the hands of France's largest power supplier.

Lake Acquisitions said yesterday that, by 1pm on Friday, it had received "valid acceptances" in respect of 644,291,988 British Energy shares – representing 62.19 per cent of the issued share capital in the firm.

That, combined with its existing 26.48 per cent stake in the firm, took its holding to 88.67 per cent.

It move to re-open the offer comes just days after the European Commission extended its competition review of the takeover to 22 December.

EDF said in a statement: "The board of Lake Acquisitions further announces that… the offers, which remain subject to the terms and conditions set out or referred to in the offer document, are being extended and will remain open for acceptance until the next closing date which will be 1pm on 5 January 2009."

Broker Charles Stanley issued a "hold" notice on BE following yesterday's announcement, adding that the firm's share price had climbed 38.4 per cent over the past 12 months.

BE yesterday closed just 4p higher at 764p.

The deal, which won the approval of the French and British governments, hands over BE's eight nuclear plants to EDF – already the world's largest nuclear plant operator with 58 reactors in France. The French firm also plans eventually to open four more in England.

The SNP Scottish Government has made it clear it is opposed to nuclear power in Scotland and would block any plans by EDF to build new nuclear power plants north of the Border.

However, in a recent interview with The Scotsman, a senior director at EDF said the company would not rule out a nuclear Scotland in the future.

Bernard Dupraz, director general of production and engineering at EDF, said that he believed the current anti-nuclear political stance in Scotland could have changed dramatically by 2030.

France gets about 80 percent of its energy from nuclear plants – the highest percentage of any major industrialised country.

The original EDF/BE deal was reached after the French firm sweetened a bid that BE had rejected in July. EDF offered 774p for every ordinary share of British Energy – an increase of 9p per share from its previous bid in July.

In addition to creating thousands of jobs around the new nuclear power plants, EDF also wants to create a centre of excellence somewhere in the UK to train British engineers to work on new nuclear reactors.

It is still unclear how many of these jobs are likely to be based in East Kilbride.