The Tanfield Group PLC has received a provisional offer on its electric vehicle division, Smith Electric Vehicles.
The offer is worth £37 million, equivalent to 50 pence per existing share plus a £33.3 million contingent credit fund prior to September 2015.
The non-binding, conditional offer comes from Smith Electric Vehicles US (SERVUS) which wishes to buy up its UK counterpart.
Tanfield’s board has granted SEVUS a four month period of exclusivity for the clarification and negotiation of this offer. The board is examining tax efficient methods that would return as much of the cash/value to shareholders as possible.
Smith Electric Vehicles is known for supplying electric vans and trucks for urban fleet operations to customers across the UK and Europe, including Sainsbury’s, TNT, DHL, TK Maxx and Scottish & Southern Energy.
The firm expects to issue its results for the year ended 31st December 2009 during the month of April. The UK company made a loss of £11m to the half year ended 30th June 2009, with it indicated that no improvement in trading conditions was made in the second half of 2009. The company expects to report net cash at 31 December 2009 of around £5 million.
A further announcement will be made in due course.
