Unilever buys 82pc stake in GSK’s health food division in Bangladesh
Unilever bought more than 82 % stakes in GlaxoSmithKline's well being food and drinks organization in Bangladesh from Setfirst yesterday through the block market in its push to help expand its footprint in Asia's fast-growing economies.
The block industry is a platform of a stock exchange where a sizable number of securities are traded in one transaction at a negotiated price.
Some 9,875,144 shares of GSK Bangladesh were traded on the market market worth Tk 2,020.75 crore at Tk 2,046.30 each, data from the Dhaka Stock Exchange showed.
The remaining 18 % shares are held by general investors and institutional investors. Of these, institutional investors own 15.53 % share, general investors 2.12 % and foreign investors 0.37 per cent by February 29 this season, according to the DSE.
Setfirst, among the corporate directors of the multinational enterprise, expressed its intention to sell its entire holding of 98.75 lakh shares to Unilever Overseas Holdings BV in compliance with the currency markets regulator, the business said the other day on the DSE website.
When the principal agreement was inked in 2018, GSK's inventory was trading at Tk 1,084, but it traded Tk 2,110 yesterday.
Unilever is also purchasing GSK's entire wellbeing foodstuff and drinks portfolio in India aswell as in 20 other Asian countries for approximately $3.74 billion, after it fought off competition from rivals Nestlé and Coca-Cola.
In April, Unilever announced that Hindustan Unilever Ltd (HUL), India's greatest fast-going consumer goods company and Unilever's listed subsidiary in India, successfully accomplished the merger of GSK Consumer Healthcare Ltd with HUL.
The merger was based on the company's strategy to evolve the foods and refreshment portfolio into higher growth segments, it said then.
GSK is a good science-led global healthcare provider with a wide range of impressive medicines, vaccines and client healthcare products.
The annals of GSK Bangladesh dates back to almost seven years, and carrying out a number of mergers and acquisitions, GSK Bangladesh, a subsidiary of the British multinational company GSK Plc, started its journey in 2002.
GSK Bangladesh's goods include diet and oral healthcare goods, led by brands like Horlicks and Sensodyne. The consumer healthcare business delivered a compound annual growth fee of 6.8 per cent in the last two years.
However, the Uk multinational shuttered its 60-year-old pharmaceuticals organization in Bangladesh in 2018. The pharmaceuticals unit, located in Chattogram, incurred losses in the last five years, much to the concern of the GSK Bangladesh board.
With a view to protecting against further losses, the plank decided to bring down the curtains on the business.
GSK continued to outperform opponents in both health food drinks and toothpaste, with the company's share increasing to 95.8 per cent in medical food drink category, an increase of 0.3 % over 2017. The talk about of GSK traded 3.11 per cent, or 63.7 points, larger on the DSE yesterday, helping the market result in positive territory.
Source: www.thedailystar.net
