Shares in Unilever slumped almost 8% after it emerged that GlaxoSmithKline had rebuffed three takeover offers from the FTSE 100 company for its consumer health arm (The Telegraph).
More than £7bn was wiped off the value of Unilever yesterday after investors and analysts raised concerns over plans to pursue a takeover of GlaxoSmithKline’s consumer healthcare business (The Times £).
Unilever has defended its £50bn bid for the consumer health unit of GlaxoSmithKline as sceptical investors sent the group’s shares down 7% to their lowest level in almost five years (The Financial Times £).
It is understood Unilever is preparing a fourth offer for the business, reports The Mail.
Unilever could sell all or part of its foods and refreshments business to help it to fund an improved offer for GSK’s consumer healthcare business, the group indicated yesterday (The Times £).
With a sliding share price and widespread City scepticism over a potential blockbuster takeover of GlaxoSmithKline’s consumer healthcare business, Unilever’s boss struggled to get back on the front foot yesterday (The Times £).
Unilever has pledged to grow its health, beauty and hygiene business and sell slower-growing operations as investors dumped its shares after its failed £50bn approach for GlaxoSmithKline’s consumer products arm (The Guardian).
A longer article in The Telegraph says Unilever’s Glaxo quest left investors reaching for the painkillers.
An opinion column in The Financial Times (£) examines “the basic problem with Unilever’s £50bn healthcare bid”. That basic problem is whether the kind of sustainable or socially-engaged management that Unilever offers is being used as a smokescreen for poor execution.
The Telegraph’s business editorial thunders that ‘Unilever’s empire-building ambitions expose the empty rhetoric of its woke ideology’. “Investors may ask whether £50bn megabid for Glaxo’s healthcare brands is a tacit admission that Unilever’s board is short of ideas.”
Unilever’s bid for GSK consumables isn’t quite the shocker it seems, argues The Guardian in its business editorial. “This could be a long campaign and, despite all the difficulties, there is a logic to the proposal.”
A business editorial in The Times (£) asks ‘what hope for Jope and Glaxo ploy?’.
GlaxoSmithKline is courting the sovereign wealth funds of Qatar and Singapore as cornerstone investors in a listing of its £50bn consumer business as it seeks to head off a risky takeover by Unilever (The Telegraph).
A British start-up is preparing to make driverless food deliveries for Ocado and Asda this year after raising $200m (£147m) from investors including Sir Richard Branson (The Telegraph).
Supermarket Morrisons has confirmed it has cut sick pay for unvaccinated workers who are forced to isolate after being exposed to Covid (BBC News).
A comment section in The Times (£) bid farewell to John Sainsbury, “the great raging volcano of retail”.
Amazon has halted a plan to ban customers using UK-issued Visa credit cards from this week, as the companies work on a “potential solution” to a rancorous dispute that threatened to severely disrupt shoppers (The Financial Times £).
Amazon has backtracked on plans to ban the use of Visa credit cards for UK orders just days before the change was due to take effect (The Telegraph).
On Monday morning, Amazon started sending affected customers emails telling them they would be able to continue to use their Visa credit cards to pay for items, and for Amazon Prime (The Guardian).
A London-based operator of “vertical farms” has raised £21m with the aim of growing crops indoors at an “industrial scale” (The Times £).
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