Cordlife receives offer for 10% stake from subsidiary of stem cell company Medeze
[SINGAPORE] Private cord-blood bank Cordlife announced on Tuesday (May 13) that it has received a voluntary conditional cash partial offer for a 10 per cent stake in the company from Medeze Treasury, a wholly owned subsidiary of Medeze, a South-east Asian stem cell company.
This is the Thai-listed group's first step into the Singapore market, as the company seeks to explore business opportunities with Cordlife.
The subsidiary of Medeze is seeking to acquire about 25.6 million shares at an offer price of S$0.25 per share. This reflects a premium of around 61.3 per cent over the last traded price of S$0.155 on Friday, and also the 12-month volume-weighted average price.
According to the offeror, it believes there are long-term opportunities that could benefit both Medeze Treasury and Cordlife with the voluntary conditional cash partial offer, including the promotion of services together for market expansion, products and services development, diversification of business in the region, and cost and operational synergies by leveraging each other's expertise.
As at Tuesday, Medeze Treasury holds nearly 1.7 million shares representing close to 0.7 per cent of the voting rights in Cordlife.
Assuming that the offer becomes unconditional and there are no changes to the number of shares up for offer, the resultant direct shareholding of the Medeze Treasury in Cordlife shall be around 10.7 per cent of the shares (excluding treasury shares) as at the record date.
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In a company statement, an example is provided where Medeze Group could offer services such as analysing and storing natural killer cell and hair follicle banking services to Cordlife's customers. Meanwhile, Cordlife could offer its chromosomal and genetic analysis and screening services to the customers of the offeror, if their collaboration eventuates. Such collaboration could strengthen the market position of both Cordlife and Medeze Group, and growth on an international level.
A private company incorporated in Singapore in May 2021, Medeze Treasury has an authorised share capital of close to S$27.3 million consisting of one class of ordinary shares of S$1 each.
Its directors are Sharon Lim and Veerapol Khemarangsan.
The Medeze Group has been listed on Thailand's stock exchange since October 2024, with a market capitalisation of about S$305.6 million as at May 13. It is engaged in the business of analysing, sorting, culturing and storing stem cells and testing the potential of immune cells.
Earlier in March, Cordlife sunk into the red with a net loss of S$6.3 million for its second half ended Dec 31, 2024, compared with a net profit of S$1.3 million in the previous corresponding period. This was mainly due to the fallout from lapses discovered in the storage of the company's cord-blood units two years ago.
Cordlife requested a trading halt on Tuesday morning. The counter closed 1.9 per cent or S$0.003 lower at S$0.155 on Friday.
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