|
Philips to cut ASML stake
|
 |
June 7, 2000: 6:13 a.m. ET
Dutch electronics firm to sell $2.3B stake in maker of chip machinery maker
|
LONDON (CNNfn) - Dutch electronics giant Philips Electronics unveiled Wednesday plans to sell 60 million shares of ASM Lithography, worth about  2.4 billion ($2.3 billion), sending shares of the computer chip equipment maker into a tailspin on the Amsterdam stock exchange.
Shares of ASML fell 9.2 percent to 39.56 in Wednesday morning trade. Philips, which had already expressed its willingness to pare its 24-percent stake in ASML, shed 2.6 percent to 49.52.
Philips now owns 99 million ASML shares. The company said Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse First Boston, which are underwriting the sale, might increase the sale by another 9 million shares if demand calls for it.
"We've been a very happy shareholder," said Philips spokesman Jeremy Cohen, but he added: "Strategically we didn't need to have the holding: ASML is a maker of chip-making equipment and we make chips -- this has never been a core holding."
Philips in March sold 20 percent of its stake in fiber-optic equipment maker JDS Uniphase (JDSU: Research, Estimates) for 525 million. But the Dutch company Philips has also been on the acquisition trail as it shakes up its range of businesses: late last month it made a $1.1 billion buyout bid for U.S. medical electronics firm MedQuist, 
|
|
|
|
|
|
Philips
ASM Lithography
|
Note: Pages will open in a new browser window
External sites are not endorsed by CNNmoney
|
|
|
|
 |
|
