Perrigo is still standing strong against Mylan’s takeover attempt, rejecting the latest offer of $75 in cash and 2.3 shares for every share of Perrigo on the basis that is undervalues the business.
The Dublin, Ireland-based group is arguing that the new offer remains under Mylan’s original bid value of $205 per share, because the latter’s stock was subsequently inflated by speculation over Teva’s interest in acquiring the firm.
“Today’s announcement from Mylan continues to propose a price lower than the previously rejected proposal,” Perrigo said, insisting that “based on Mylan’s unaffected price of $55.31 per share on March 10, 2015, the last day of trading prior to widespread public speculation that Teva was considering an offer for Mylan, the value of the revised Offer is $202.20 per Perrigo share”.
Mylan is desperate to complete its plans to acquire Perrigo because that would protect it from being snapped up by Teva.
Pen wars
Meanwhile the growing spat between Teva and Mylan chiefs continues to be aired in public. Mylan head Robert Coury sent Teva chief Erez Vigodman a hugely critical letter outlining his objection to the move, highlighting the latter’s “poor record of delivering sustainable shareholder value”.
Now Teva has retaliated with a responding letter, slamming Coury for his “fundamentally distorted picture” of Teva and asserting that “stakeholders do not support, or benefit from, mudslinging, mischaracterization, rehashing of history or selective presentation of facts”.
“Instead, I would prefer to return the dialogue to the significant value creation opportunity that a combination of Teva and Mylan represents,” Vigodman wrote. In a further dig, he notes “I fully agree with you that it would have been preferable to have engaged in a private discussion to explore this transaction. However, you left us no choice but to make our proposal public after you publicly rejected a potential offer before it had even been made”.
By Selina McKee