Aker ASA selling remaining 40.1% share of Aker Yards

Aker ASA selling remaining 40.1% share of Aker Yards The share price of Europe’s largest shipbuilder, Aker Yards, dropped by almost 12 percent on Wednesday after news that its main shareholder, Aker ASA, is selling all of its 40.1 percent stake.
   Aker ASA’s decision comes three months after it cut its holding in the Norwegian shipbuilder from 50.4 percent by selling 2.34 million shares.
   A further 9.1 million of Aker Yards’ shares will now be offered to Norwegian and international institutional investors in a book-built offering managed by J.P. Morgan and SEB Enskilda, according to a release distributed to European media. Based on Wednesday’s closing price on the Oslo Stock Exchange of 495 Norwegian Krone ($80.77), Aker ASA would net about NKr5.1 billion ($832.2 million).
   Aker Yards employs nearly 20,000 people and has a total of 17 yards in Norway, Finland, Germany, France, Ukraine, Romania and Brazil. In addition, the company is building a yard for offshore and specialized vessels in Vietnam. It finished 2006 with a net profit of NKr1.04 billion ($169.1 million), up 34 percent over 2005 on a revenue gain of 56 percent to NKr25.9 billion ($4.22 billion).
   Aker ASA said the sale would allow it to free up both managerial capacity and financial resources to its other companies in the oil, gas, energy and process industries, as well as to target new businesses.
   “We are confident that our share sale will inspire Aker Yards’ board, management and employees to continue their excellent development of the company,” said Leif-Arne Lang'y, Aker ASA’s chairman and chief executive officer. “We also consider that greater share liquidity will enhance Aker Yards’ attractiveness to investors and the stock market in general.”
   Lang'y is also chairman of Aker Yards, a position he will relinquish on March 29 after the shipbuilder’s annual general meeting.
   Karl Erik Kjelstad, president and CEO of Aker Yards, said the company would “participate actively in the sales process for Aker’s shares,” and along with other senior executives has committed to buy NKr7 million ($1.14 million) worth of shares.
   “While this transition is wistful, it also heralds the beginning of a new phase for Aker Yards,” he said.
   Kjelstad added that the ownership change would not affect its activities in the United States shipbuilding market, where it has developed a high profile for reviving a long-dormant navy shipyard in Philadelphia.
   It is building a series of 16 46,000-deadweight-ton product tankers for Overseas Shipholding Group for use in coastal trading. The tankers are built by Aker Yards and then transferred to another Aker ASA company, American Shipping Corp., which in turn, bareboat charters them to subsidiaries of OSG for initial terms of 10 to 15 years.
   “We will continue our cooperation with other Aker companies,” Kjelstad said. “We will continue our partnership with Aker American Shipping under the existent cooperation agreement. Aker, Aker Kv'rner, and Aker Yards have generated strategic business opportunities and created significant value,” he added.
   Another consequence of Aker ASA’s divestment is that Aker Yards will not be relocating to Aker Hus, a new office complex under construction outside Oslo, but instead will find other premises in the Oslo region.