Links
BASF agrees to buy Cognis for $3.8 billion
BASF SE can escape the hangover of a post-takeover revamp with its purchase of Cognis GmbH after a decade of private-equity ownership left the German maker of cosmetics ingredients with about 3,500 fewer workers.
BASF, the world's No. 1 chemical maker, today agreed to pay Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Permira Advisers Ltd. 3.1 billion euros ($3.8 billion) for the Monheim, Germany-based company. The two buyout firms purchased Cognis from Henkel AG in 2001 and spent the following years selling leather processing and fatty- acids units, helping cut 39 percent of the workforce.
"Cognis is in a much better shape than two or three years before, it's much more streamlined," BASF Chief Executive Officer Juergen Hambrecht told reporters on a call today.
BASF's last major takeover, Ciba Holding AG, saddled the company with the task of 3,800 job cuts and closing 14 factories and 58 non-production sites, in what Hambrecht today called a "restructuring case." At Cognis, the sale of units accounted for the bulk of the workforce reduction and helped narrow the business focus, prompting the BASF executive to return with an offer after abandoning the plan several years earlier.