Romi enters into a preliminary agreement to acquire assets from Italian manufacturer of plastic injection molding machines

This operation, amounting 5.5 millions Euros, is part of the company’s internationalization strategy

Indústrias Romi S.A., the Brazilian market leader in machine tools and machinery for processing plastics, has entered into a preliminary agreement for acquiring assets from Sandretto Industrie S.r.l., an important Italian manufacturer of plastic injection molding machines. The acquisition still depends on the final approval by the Industrias Romi shareholders meeting. Sandretto owns two industrial units in the Italian cities of Grugliasco and Pont Canavese, in the Turim area, apart from four commercial subsidiaries located in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Spain and France and several service centers, sales offices and commercial representatives in several countries.

“The operation is part of the Romi internationalization strategy for expanding its production basis and markets, obtaining scale and reducing costs to increase its sales worldwide”, states Mr. Livaldo Aguiar dos Santos, President of Romi. By negotiating the acquisition, the company seeks three strategic objectives: enlarge the distribution basis of its machinery, taking advantage of the wide Sandretto’s commercial network; develop a technological center within a region that offers a recognized know-how in the machinery segment and enlarge its worldwide suppliers development policy”.

Sandretto has been in a special process of financial recovery since 2006 and has been managed by Italian government representatives, having registered a consolidated net income of approximately 30 millions of euros in 2007.

Romi will pay € 5.5 millions for the Sandretto assets (facilities, machinery and equipment, technology, trademarks and patents, among other). The raw material stocks, ongoing and finished products are not included in the abovementioned price, however should be acquired by Romi for an amount to be negotiated with Sandretto not superior to the market value. Romi have also undertook the commitment of contracting the present 295 Sandretto’s employees, holders of relevant professional experience, as well as to invest €8 millions into the operations within two years as from the acquisition date. With the assets transfer Romi Italia will give continuity to the Sandretto industrial, commercial operations, and services rendered.

The final negotiation for the acquisition will be carried out by Romi Italia, a company in the final stage of being founded in the city of Turim, which will be an integral subsidiary of Romi Europa GmbH. The acquisition still depends on the final approval by the Industrias Romi shareholders meeting, a company with shares traded in the New Bovespa Market, to be accomplished in June 4th.

Founded in 1946, Sandretto has already sold more than 30 thousand machines around the world. Its machinery line is comprised by plastics injection machines with capacity of 75 to 5,500 tons of closing power  – parameter that determines the size of the plastic part produced.