Friday, June 7, 2013

Reuters: Technology News: Micron deal for Elpida Memory appears to clear legal hurdle

Posted by Isabella on 4:13 PM

Reuters: Technology News
Reuters.com is your source for breaking news, business, financial and investing news, including personal finance and stocks. Reuters is the leading global provider of news, financial information and technology solutions to the world's media, financial institutions, businesses and individuals. // via fulltextrssfeed.com
Micron deal for Elpida Memory appears to clear legal hurdle
Jun 7th 2013, 22:25

  • Tweet
  • Share this
  • Email
  • Print
Elpida chips are seen at an electronic store in Tokyo's Akihabara district April 24, 2012. REUTERS/Toru Hanai

Elpida chips are seen at an electronic store in Tokyo's Akihabara district April 24, 2012.

Credit: Reuters/Toru Hanai

By Tom Hals

Fri Jun 7, 2013 6:25pm EDT

(Reuters) - Micron Technologies Inc's planned acquisition of bankrupt Japanese chipmaker Elpida Memory Inc appeared to move closer to completion on Friday after a key deadline passed without a legal challenge.

U.S. creditors had until 4 p.m. on Friday to object to the request by Elpida to have a U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware issue orders that would enforce its Japanese restructuring, according to court records.

At the center of the restructuring is the proposed sale to Micron for 200 billion yen (about $2.1 billion), which will create the world's second-largest maker of memory chips.

Micron, based in Boise, Idaho, has been losing money as smart phones and tablets gain in popularity at the expense of personal computers. Acquiring Elpida will create economies of scale and the combined company will rank second only to Samsung Electronics in the memory chip market.

While the sale proceeds will be used to repay Elpida's creditors, U.S. bondholders argued Elpida was worth up to 300 billion yen.

In May, the bondholders exhausted their legal challenges in Japan. The only avenue left to them was in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware, where Elpida had sought recognition for its bankruptcy plan under Chapter 15 of the U.S. bankruptcy code.

The creditors had been actively resisting the deal last year and earlier this year. However, they suffered a setback in January when U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Christopher Sontchi approved a technology deal with Micron that the creditors warned would make the merger inevitable.

The bondholders are led by hedge funds Linden Advisors, Owl Creek Asset Management and Taconic Capital Advisers.

Messages left with the funds and their attorney, Christopher Shore of White & Case, were not immediately returned on Friday.

The U.S. case is In re: Elpida Memory Inc, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, District of Delaware, No. 12-10947

(Reporting by Tom Hals; Editing by Bernard Orr)

  • Tweet this
  • Link this
  • Share this
  • Digg this
  • Email
  • Reprints
We welcome comments that advance the story through relevant opinion, anecdotes, links and data. If you see a comment that you believe is irrelevant or inappropriate, you can flag it to our editors by using the report abuse links. Views expressed in the comments do not represent those of Reuters. For more information on our comment policy, see http://blogs.reuters.com/fulldisclosure/2010/09/27/toward-a-more-thoughtful-conversation-on-stories/

Comments (0)

Be the first to comment on reuters.com.

Add yours using the box above.
You are receiving this email because you subscribed to this feed at blogtrottr.com.

If you no longer wish to receive these emails, you can unsubscribe from this feed, or manage all your subscriptions

0 comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)

 
Great HTML Templates from easytemplates.com.