Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Staples won’t buy all of Office Depot’s stock — for now
Staples, the chief rival of Office Depot, is delaying its plan to try to buy all of the stock of the Boca Raton-based company after its attempted takeover bid was rejected.
Staples, which is on its third try to buy Office Depot, said Wednesday it will “evaluate” its alternatives such as acquiring Office Depot’s consumer retail business or other parts of the company. Staples said it reserves the right to start a tender offer for the shares of ODP, Office Depot’s parent, at a later date.
Investors pushed ODP stock upward by 7.4% to $43.64 on Wednesday, which suggests they believe the price of their shares could rise.
The back and forth between the two companies leaves thousands of jobs hanging in the balance in South Florida and elsewhere around the U.S. and Canada.
Last May, Office Depot announced a three-year plan to cut its work force of some 40,000 people by 13,100 over a threeyear period. It remained unclear how far
along management has gone in executing those plans.
An Office Depot spokesman declined comment beyond its public statements outlining why it rejected Staples’ offer.
In a March 15 statement, the ODP board said Staples failed to place a value on the assets that Staples seeks to buy, did not include a commitment by Staples to proceed with a transaction, did not agree to a purchase price and did not “assume any related regulatory risk.”
“ODP reiterated that, as it has previously stated — including in its letter to Staples dated January 19, 2021 — the company is open to combining its retail and consumer-facing ecommerce operations with Staples under the right set of circumstances and on mutually acceptable terms, including in the form of a joint venture or potential sale of such assets by ODP,” the statement said.
“ODP encouraged Staples once again to engage on the basis of that approach,” the statement added.
A spokeswoman for USR, which controls Staples, said the company would have no further comment beyond its statement Wednesday. USR is part of Sycamore Partners, the private equity group that owns Staples.
In two previous Staples attempts to acquire Office Depot, the buyouts were blocked by regulators over antitrust concerns.
Staples has notified U.S. and Canadian authorities about its continuing interest in Office Depot and said it continues to work “diligently” with the Federal Trade Commission and the Canadian Competition Bureau to obtain approvals from both agencies.