Oerlikon Closes Sulzer Metco Ahead of Plan, Raises Forecast
June 3 (Bloomberg) — OC Oerlikon AG, a Swiss maker of textile machinery, closed its $1.1 billion deal to buy the coatings units of crosstown rival Sulzer AG earlier than planned and raised its full-year sales forecast.
“We are aware it needs hard and consistent work to realize the value of this transaction,” Chief Executive Officer Brice Koch said in a statement. “The full value will become visible from 2016 onwards.”
Pfaeffikon, Switzerland-based Oerlikon increased its forecast for revenue growth to 15 percent from an earlier outlook of “sales growth” to account for Metco, which makes coatings for industrial tools and airplane engine parts. The company expects its full-year margin on earnings before interest and taxes to be about 10 percent.
Since starting in January, former ABB Ltd. executive Koch has been tasked with integrating Sulzer’s coatings division, which Oerlikon agreed to buy earlier this year for 1 billion Swiss francs. For Sulzer, the deal will generate cash of about 850 million francs to fund acquisitions in the pumps business, which brings in the majority of its revenue.
Both swiss companies share Russian billionaire Viktor Vekselberg as their largest shareholder. The world’s 63rd richest person, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires list, Vekselberg controls about 44 percent of Oerlikon, and 31 percent of Sulzer, through Renova Group, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
In February, Vekselberg beefed up the team managing his Swiss assets by hiring Peter Loescher, the Austrian ousted as Siemens AG CEO, to head Renova Management AG, his industrial holding company.
To contact the reporter on this story: Patrick Winters in Zurich at pwinters3@bloomberg.net To contact the editors responsible for this story: Simon Thiel at sthiel1@bloomberg.net Kim McLaughlin, Thomas Mulier