PDL quits plastics business

The company has agreed to sell the assets and business of PDL Plastics to Alto Plastics, a company formed by PDL's current general manager Mark Wheeler and his management team in conjunction with ANZ Private Equity.

The net sale price is expected to exceed $25 million and be marginally above book value, and includes both operational plants of PDL Plastics in Auckland and Christchurch as well as the Australian-based plastics sales operation.

Under the agreement the 370 staff at PDL Plastics will be employed by Alto Plastics on the same terms and conditions.

PDL chief executive, Mark Stewart, says the sale is part of PDL's strategy of concentrating on hi-tech, high-value products, with major growth opportunities being in electrical and electronics products. He says Mark Wheeler and his team were considered strong candidates for a management buyout from the outset.

"This is demonstrated by PDL's signing of a five-year supply agreement with Alto Plastics for the on-going supply of some plastic components."

Mr Stewart says that while PDL Plastics has been a significant historic contributor to the growth of the PDL, the company's future direction in the global environment was about specialising in its core strengths in research and development.

The sale is expected to be settled by the end of next month.

Comments from our readers

No comments yet

Add your comment:

Your name:
Your email:	Not displayed to the public
Comment:
Comments to Sharechat go through an approval process. Comments which are defamatory, abusive or in some way deemed inappropriate will not be approved. It is allowable to use some form of non-de-plume for your name, however we recommend real email addresses are used. Comments from free email addresses such as Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, etc may not be approved.

Anti-spam verification:

Type the text you see in the image into the field below. You are asked to do this in order to verify that this enquiry is not being performed by an automated process.