Friday 29 Mar 2024
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KUALA LUMPUR: Kian Joo Can Factory Bhd announced that it has mutually agreed with Aspire Insight Sdn Bhd to extend the completion of the disposal of its entire business to the latter to Sept 23, 2015.

“On behalf of the board of directors of Kian Joo (fundamental: 1.0; valuation: 0.6), MIDF Investment Bank Bhd wishes to announce that Kian Joo and Aspire have agreed to extend the date on which all conditions precedent to the BSA [business sale agreement] should be fulfilled from March 23, 2015 to Sept 23, 2015,” Kian Joo said in a filing with Bursa Malaysia yesterday.

This is the second extension — the agreement was executed in March 2014 and was supposed to be completed in the fourth quarter of 2014 but was extended until March 23. To recap, Aspire had on Nov 23, 2013 announced that it intended to acquire Kian Joo’s entire business, including all its assets and liabilities, for RM1.466 billion or RM3.30 per share. Then on March 24 last year, Kian Joo said it had entered into the BSA with Aspire for the disposal. In the same announcement, it promised to distribute not less than RM3.30 per share from the proceeds of the sale to all entitled shareholders in cash.

However, Kian Joo executive director Datuk Anthony See Teow Guan, who holds 1.63% of Kian Joo, opposed the deal. See’s father founded Kian Joo some 40 years ago. See claimed that the takeover deal should be deemed a related party transaction because of the connections between Kian Joo  managing director Yeoh Jin Hoe, who is also the controling shareholder of Can-One Bhd, and former Can-One chief operating officer Chee Khay Leong and Can-One, which is the single largest shareholder of Kian Joo, holding a 32.9% stake. See is of the view that Can-One should be prevented from voting on the takeover offer. 

Chee, who is still the executive director of Kian Joo, resigned from his post in Can-One a few days before Aspire announced the takeover offer. The sale of Kian Joo to Aspire, now mired in a series of legal suits, is still pending a hearing in the Court of Appeal in April.

 

This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on March 19, 2015.

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