Osim founder Ron Sim is close to privatising the company now his family has acquired, agreed to acquire, owns or controls 90.64 per cent of the lifestyle products group’s shares.
Credit Suisse, which is acting on behalf of Sim, says 90 per cent is the threshold for him to compulsorily acquire minority shareholdings. Also, 90 per cent is the threshold where a stock can be suspended from trading as the public float has fallen below 10 per cent.
Vision Three, a special-purpose vehicle owned by Sim, can exercise its legal right of compulsory acquisition once it receives acceptances of 90 per cent of shares that it did not own pre-offer. As Vision Three is a new entity, it did not own any shares before making the offer on March 7.
Announcing his privatisation bid on March 7, Sim says he wanted to be able to make quicker corporate decisions. On April 5, he confounded the market by halting share trading in Osim International after announcing an upwardly revised takeover offer.
