Tissue World Magazine
Alexandra Stuthridge, Technical Business Manager, BioProducts Institute (BPI)

(News from RISI) – The Slovenian tissue producer Paloma has started a process to raise its capital by Euro 15m ($17m) in order to enhance efficiency and its financial results by modernising its production facilities, increasing its capacity and removing current bottlenecks.
The firm operates a 70,000tpy mill in Sladki Vrh.

Paloma has launched an invitation for non-binding expressions of interest in the capital increase. Existing shareholders’ priority rights to subscribe new shares will be excluded.

The process will be run as a two-round international tender process with submission of indicative offers in the first phase and submission of binding offers in the second phase following due diligence, according to a company statement.

The deadline for submitting indicative offers is on 16 March.

If the capital increase is successful and if an investor alone or together with partners obtains at least a third of the voting rights in Paloma, the investor will be obliged to publish a take-over bid in accordance with the Slovenian Takeover Act.

After the indicative offers have been reviewed and evaluated, Paloma may invite selected investors to participate in the second phase of the tender process. These will be invited to conduct due diligence on the firm before submitting binding offers.

Paloma said that the opening, review and evaluation of both the indicative offers and the binding offers will not be public.
The firm has appointed Erste Group Bank and the financial advisor P&S CAPITAL as financial advisers for the process.

In 2013, the state of Slovenia started a process to sell its 70.97% holding in Paloma as part of a broader privatisation program.