(Updates with comments from Zentiva statement, share price,
background)
AMSTERDAM, Sept 3 (Reuters) - Sanofi-Aventis's <SASY.PA>
offer for Czech generic drug maker Zentiva <>, which
values it at 40 billion crowns ($2.34 billion), does not reflect
the company's worth and should not be accepted, the company's
chief executive told shareholders on Wednesday.
Noting that the offer of 1,050 Czech crowns per share was
below the company's current share price of 1,066 crowns, Jiri
Michal said the company was set to increase sales by 20 percent
this year, and that the offer's valuation was not in line with
comparable generic drugmakers.
"There is still big potential," Michal told Reuters on the
sidelines of the special shareholder meeting in Amsterdam,
adding that Zentiva was positioned in Central and Eastern Europe
to market its products to 440 million people.
"The Sanofi offer fails to reflect the unique strategic
position that we have built in the CEE region in the sector of
generics over the last three years," Zentiva said in a statement
released after the meeting.
By accepting the offer shareholders could lose an
opportunity to participate, "in the benefits of a potential
synergistic transaction" or to receive a premium from a
potential sale of a controlling stake in the company, Zentiva
said, reiterating a statement from July.
Zentiva's chief financial officer told Reuters earlier on
Wednesday that Zentiva is seeking a partner to boost its
presence in target markets and could acquire a smaller peer or
be taken over by a bigger peer in the next two to three years.
Zentiva, which has an Amsterdam listing, called the meeting
to discuss the bid but no vote was scheduled. The offer from
Sanofi, which already has a 24.9 percent stake, values the
shares it does not own at 30 billion crowns.
Czech financial group PPF, which owns 19.2 percent of
Zentiva with Italian insurer Generali <GASI.MI>, had offered 950
crowns per share for the company but officially withdrew its bid
on July 30.
No other offers have since been made.
If Sanofi wins the bid, which runs through Sept. 19, it
would give the world's third-largest drug maker by sales a
bigger foothold in the fast-growing central and eastern European
markets.
It would also take it deeper into generic drug production,
an area which until recently was generally shunned by large
pharmaceutical groups.
Zentiva's shares closed 0.47 percent higher at 1,073 crowns
on Wednesday, outperforming Prague's main PX <> index which
was down 1.3 percent.
(Reporting by Reed Stevenson; additional reporting by Jana
Mlcochova in Prague, Editing by Quentin Bryar, Greg Mahlich)
