One morning early in 1985, on the stroke of nine o’clock, Sir Owen Green, chairman of the industrial behemoth BTR, strode into the elegant central London offices of Dunlop, the tyre and rubber company, and delivered a takeover bid directly into the hands of its newly appointed chairman, Sir Michael Edwardes. In silence, Green, who has died aged 92, then turned on his heel and left. Although BTR (formerly Birmingham Tyre and Rubber) was later forced to raise its opening bid, the fate of Dunlop, already struggling to survive, had been sealed.
Edwardes, then riding high in the corporate world on a reputation gained from turning around the troubled car maker British Leyland, had been brought in to save Dunlop, which had debts of half a billion pounds. Green, chief executive as well as chairman of BTR, was already a feared and seasoned operator in corporate takeovers from his earlier bitter but successful battle for the industrial group Thomas Tilling.
Continue reading...from Mergers and acquisitions | The Guardian http://ift.tt/2tLFjhS
No comments:
Post a Comment