CertainTeed Corp. is attempting to take over fiberglass processor Brunswick Technologies Inc., but has refused to say how the acquisition would affect CertainTeed's vinyl building products business. The Valley Forge, Pa.-based company last week offered $8 cash for each of Brunswick's 5.2 million outstanding shares.
Vetrotex CertainTeed Corp., CertainTeed's fiberglass reinforcements business, currently owns about 14 percent of BTI's outstanding shares. However, Brunswick, Maine-based BTI promptly announced the company is not for sale. It said it has implemented a shareholder-rights plan that would dilute outstanding shares so that no one entity could own more than 15 percent of the company.
CertainTeed has made repeated offers to buy the company, but those offers were rejected, a CertainTeed news release said. Though it prefers to negotiate with BTI representatives, CertainTeed believes in asking the shareholders what they want if the representatives are uncooperative, the news release said.
Meantime, CertainTeed would not comment on how BTI would complement the company's vinyl building products.
"We've laid out an offer for the company and until we get some kind of responses back, it's not something we're really [discussing]," a CertainTeed spokesman said in an April 20 telephone interview.
CertainTeed is a wholly owned subsidiary of Paris-based Cie. de Saint-Gobain. CertainTeed reported 1998 extrusion sales of $594 million, putting it in the No. 2 spot on Plastics News' ranking of North American pipe, profile and tubing extruders. Overall company sales for 1999 reached $2 billion.
